Parole hearing set for Susan Smith 30 years after the death of her children in SC
A date for a parole hearing has been set for convicted murderer Susan Smith more than 30 years after her two young sons were killed.
On Monday, the South Carolina Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon Services said Smith’s parole eligibility hearing will be held on Nov. 20 in Columbia.
In 1995, Smith was convicted of the murder of her sons — 14-month-old Alex and 3-year-old Michael. Smith was not given the death penalty and instead was sentenced to life in prison.
While in the custody of the South Carolina Department of Corrections, the now 53-year-old Smith has spent most of her sentence at Leath Correctional Institution.
On Oct. 25, 1994, Smith told law enforcement officials she was stopped at a red light at an intersection on Main Street in the town of Union, when a Black man forced her out of the car at gunpoint and drove off with her two small sons in the back.
After a weeklong manhunt for the two boys and the would-be suspect, Smith confessed to letting her car roll into the cold waters of Union County’s John D. Long Lake with Alex and Michael strapped into the backseat.
The Black man who Smith initially accused did not exist. But her story of a Black attacker became an international news phenomenon.
Tommy Pope, who led the prosecution of Smith, previously said that the motive for killing her two children came on the heels of a letter she received from Tom Findley, the son of the owner of the Conso Products company where Smith worked as a secretary. He was breaking off the affair the two were engaged in while Smith was separated from her husband, David Smith, according to Pope.
“He writes her a Dear Jane letter saying you’re a nice girl, but I really don’t want kids,” Pope said in 2014.
Smith said that is a lie.
“The thing that hurts me the most is that people think I hurt my children in order to be with a man,” Smith said in a 2015 letter to The State. “That is so far from the truth.”
David Smith, her ex-husband and father of the boys, has vowed to fight against Smith being freed from prison, saying he intends to remind the parole board about the victims.
Smith was recently convicted of an internal disciplinary charge for talking with a filmmaker about murdering her two young sons. She lost her telephone, tablet and canteen privileges for 90 days, beginning Oct. 4.
That infraction was the first in 10 years for Smith. She has twice been charged with having drugs and once for mutilation, according to S.C. Department of Corrections records.
On Sept. 11, 2000, Smith was found guilty of sexual misconduct for engaging in sexual acts with two prison guards while incarcerated. One of the guards, Alfred Rowe, recently told News Nation she does not deserve to be paroled.
About 6% of parole applications are approved, according to the S.C. Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon Services.
Staff reporter Lyn Riddle contributed to this story.
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This story was originally published October 21, 2024 at 1:50 PM with the headline "Parole hearing set for Susan Smith 30 years after the death of her children in SC."
