Suzanne Smith, jailed for the brutal murder of her two young sons in 1994, is expected to be paroled later this month – but the parole board has been inundated with dozens of letters of protest from friends, family and the public. ,
South Carolina Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon Services Confirmed that it received over 130 letters regarding Smith’s parole bid.
Although the letters are not publicly available, a Smith family source told The Post that many of them are filled with lewd comments about Smith’s attempt to get out of prison after 30 years.
“They’re horrible,” the relative said. “They say things like ‘He’s in that lake with his boys.’ “People don’t want him out of jail and they’re telling the parole board that.”
Smith’s ex-husband David encouraged the public to write letters of protest. In an interview this summer Fox CarolinaHe said Smith should never have been released.
“She took away the greatest gift of our lives,” he said. “She took it away from them, and I want people to remember that. Maybe those who were old enough at the time remember how she felt when she found out that Michael and Alex had died and that she had done it; And perhaps they themselves write a letter to the parole board or encourage them to keep him behind bars.
A relative of David Smith told The Post he will speak to the parole board at a Nov. 20 hearing.
Smith was a 22-year-old mother when she became a household name for the murders of her sons, 3-year-old Michael and 14-month-old Alexander. In 1994, she rolled her car into John D. Long Lake in Union County, South Carolina, while her boys were still strapped into their car seats.
Smith then falsely told police that a black man had snatched his car and kidnapped the children, leading to a manhunt in which officers went door-to-door in local neighborhoods predominantly African-American. Were Americans.
Smith and her then-husband, David, appeared on national news every day, pleading for the boys’ safe return.
But nine days later, Smith finally confessed that there was no car thief, and that he had drowned his sons in the lake.
Her alleged motive: She was having an affair with a rich man who did not want children. The car was pulled out of the water with both boys dead, exactly where he had left them.
But Smith insists he has been misunderstood. one in 2015 letter He told The State newspaper that he was mentally ill.
“I am not the monster that society thinks I am. I’m far from it,” she wrote. “I am far from it. Something went very wrong that night. I was not myself. I was a good mother and I loved my boys. There was no purpose because it was not even a planned event. I was not in my right mind.”
But Smith’s road to prison has been difficult, and his chances of release appear slim.
He was punished in 2000 for having sex with two guards behind bars. She has always maintained that due to different power dynamics, the sex was not consensual.
He also has several violations, including in 2010 and 2015 for consuming narcotics or marijuana while behind bars.
But for nine years, Smith was a model prisoner — until last month, when she Convicted of trying to cash in on his notoriety By talking to a documentary maker from behind bars and discussing getting paid for his story.
Smith lost his telephone, tablet and canteen privileges for 90 days from October 4. She may receive visitors, but she has no electronic communication with anyone.
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