Читать книгу Dead And Buried: A True Story Of Serial Rape And Murder - Corey Mitchell - Страница 10

THREE

On May 25, 1996, the beginning of the Memorial Day weekend, many students were packing their bags and getting ready to return to their hometowns. The semester had ended and, for some, it was time for one last celebration. Kristin “Roxy” Smart, a 6’1” statuesque blond freshman from Stockton,California, was ready to join the fun.

Kristin was the progeny of intelligent parents. She was born at 2:00 A.M. in Augsburg, Germany, on February 20, 1977, to two teachers, Stan and Denise Smart. When her familyrelocated to the United States, her father became a high school principal in Stockton. She also had a brother and sister,Matt and Lindsey. All three of the Smart children loved swimming. Kristin excelled at the sport in high school. She also had a strong love for the state of Hawaii and the Pacific Ocean. Her love for aquatics led her to choose Cal Poly for college because of the school’s close proximity to the ocean.

Kristin had successfully made it through her first year in college, where she majored in speech communications. She looked forward to returning home for the summer, but first she wanted to party. After all, she deserved it.

Kristin started her end-of-the-year celebration at an off-campusparty thrown by fellow student Ryan Fell. The party took place on Crandall Way, less than a quarter mile from Kristin’s dorm. According to police reports, Kristin arrived at the party sober.

Two hours later, she was not.

At approximately 2:00 A.M. Kristin Smart lay in the next-doorneighbor’s yard passed out. Cheryl Anderson, who knew Kristin but was not close friends with her, and another Cal Poly student, Tim Davis, spotted her. After they roused Kristin out of her inebriated state and got the lanky, tall blonde to her feet, they began to walk her back to her dorm. About a quarter mile later, another student, Paul Flores, popped up alongside them. He informed Anderson and Davis that he met Kristin at the party earlier that night.

Flores offered to walk Kristin back to her dorm.

Kristin, Paul, Cheryl, and Tim walked northwest on Via Carta, from the raucous party, onto the main campus drive known as Perimeter, which is a three-quarter circular road that connects all of the main arteries on campus. Davis was the first to break off and go to his dorm. It was only a short trip to Muir Hall, Kristin’s dorm, so Anderson assumed everything was fine. Even though Kristin stumbled and could barely stand up straight, Anderson decided to let Flores walk her home the rest of the way. After all, it was only another one hundred yards or so. Anderson parted ways and headed off to her own dorm. Flores assured Anderson that he would get Kristin home safely.

No one has heard from or seen Kristin Smart since.

The next morning, witnesses saw Paul Flores with a black eye. He did not have it the night before at the party, accordingto several witnesses who attended.

No one reported Kristin as missing until May 28, 1996. The Cal Poly campus police supposedly took their sweet time in looking further into her disappearance. They eventually contacted her father, Stan Smart, who was now the principal at Vintage High School in Napa, California. Mr. Smart assumedthat Kristin had done something wrong at school. He was frustrated to learn that no one had seen her for almost three days.

The Cal Poly police treated Kristin’s case as a simple missing-personcase. They told her parents that it was not unusual for a student to run away and not tell their family. The Smarts, however, did not buy that theory. They knew Kristin would tell them anything if she was upset, depressed, or in some kind of trouble. As the days ticked off the calendar, however, their fear increased substantially.

The campus police conducted interviews with several studentsfrom the party—at least the students that remained on campus. They also spoke with Paul Flores and mentioned the black eye to him. Flores claimed that he got it during a basketballgame. At a second interview he recanted his story and claimed that he received the black eye while fixing his car. For some reason, the campus officers did not bother to ask him why he lied about the basketball game.

Later, Flores would tell his close friends that he had lied twice. He claimed he did not get the black eye while fixing his car. In fact, he had no clue as to how he got the shiner. He laughed as he told his friends that he was embarrassed that he did not know how it got there, so he had to make up something.

One month after the disappearance of Kristin Smart, the case switched hands from the Cal Poly campus police to the San Luis Obispo Police Department and the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department. Former San Luis Obispo sheriffEdward Williams immediately pegged Flores as the main suspect in her disappearance and began a full-scale investigationinto the young man.

Unfortunately, for the police, Flores hired an attorney and refused to speak to anyone about Kristin Smart. Despite Flores’santagonistic stance, Sheriff Williams was able to conduct a search of Flores’s dorm room. The only problem was that Flores had moved out over two months earlier and had thoroughlycleaned his room up in the process. Despite the cleaning, the sheriff’s three cadaver-sniffing dogs made a direct beeline for Flores’s dorm room. The dogs were having a field day in Flores’s old room. They bounced up and down all over the young man’s mattress, which was property of the school; therefore, it remained in the room. Unfortunately, no specific physical evidence was located.

Soon thereafter, Paul Flores dropped out of college.

His headaches were only beginning.

The Smarts began a relentless campaign to get Paul Flores to speak. They believed that he was the key to the whereaboutsof their daughter. They did everything in their power to get him to come forward and, if not confess, at least tell them what he knew about Kristin’s final moments. Their pressurecampaign consisted of sending out photo collages of Kristin to Flores’s parents, grandparents, and other relatives. The collages showed their daughter enjoying the sun, laying out at the beach, or enjoying the water with her friends. They were images of a typical gorgeous California girl, and they believed Paul Flores had a hand in her potential demise. Friends of the Smart family would also send postcards to members of Flores’s family asking them why their son would not speak with authorities. The Smarts wanted to make sure that the Flores family knew their son was the main suspect.

The Smarts indicated that the envelopes always came back to them—open. They at least knew that the Flores family was getting the message.

The Smarts, frustrated by Paul Flores’s refusal to speak, decided to pay him a visit. They traveled to a Central Californiagas station, where he worked. Their intentions were honorable; they just wanted him to help them find their daughter. According to sources, however, Flores hid in the back of the gas station and refused to speak to the bereaved family.

The Smarts made sure Paul Flores knew someone had their eye on him at all times. Private investigators volunteered their services to the family to track Flores down wherever he relocated.He eventually ended up in Southern California.

In Irvine.

Where Rachel Newhouse grew up.

The private investigators were able to find out where Flores sought employment. Anytime a potential employer encountered Paul Flores, they also received a packet of newspaper clippings from the Smarts that detailed Flores’s potential involvement in her disappearance. If they could not get the packet to the companies before they hired him, they usually received it soon thereafter. Most times, the resultwas the same: Paul Flores was not hired, or if he already had the job, he was asked for an explanation. Usually, they asked him to leave. He lost jobs at a video store, a fast-food hamburger restaurant, and Outback Steakhouse.

Frustrated, Paul Flores tried to join the U.S. Navy. The Smarts were right behind him with their packet of information.The navy refused to accept the wayward youth.

Later in 1996, the Smart family sued Paul Flores in civil court. Once again, the purpose was to force him to talk. Flores,however, remained silent by invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, and the family eventually dropped the lawsuit.

The entire incident not only left the Smarts devastated, but the Flores family was shattered as well. According to sources, Flores’s parents could no longer handle the strain of their son as a suspect in an abduction, or even murder case. Ruben and Susan Flores eventually divorced because of their son’s situation,among other problems they experienced.

Curiously, despite the hardship the Smarts have caused him, Paul Flores has never sued the family. He has also never asked for a restraining order against them.

When they realized they could not corral Paul Flores, the Smarts turned to the local police. Their frustration with the authorities,however, was apparent from the beginning. They did not understand why it took the campus police a month before they requested the services of the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department. They were outraged when the sheriff’s department took forever to search Flores’s room, long after he vacated the premises. They were also upset that the sheriff failed to test any of Flores’s items from the room for DNA evidence. This could have included the mattress and any hairs, scabs, skin flakes, and other potential DNA evidence left in the room.

The Smarts decided to turn to higher authorities: the FederalBureau of Investigation, as well as Janet Reno, the United States Attorney General. They wanted someone on their daughter’s case.

They needed to find her.

The Smarts took charge of the search for their daughter by running a full-court press on the media. They were able to get Kristin’s name and face out to millions of viewers by making numerous appearances on shows such as 20/20, Sally, Inside Edition, and America’s Most Wanted. They even visited a psychicfor a show on the Sci-Fi Channel called Sightings.

The Smarts feared that the case would simply languish, so they contacted a family friend, California State Senator Mike Thompson, St. Helena, Democrat, who was eager to lend a hand. Senator Thompson immediately drafted legislation that would require campus police departments and local law officialsto draw up written agreements as to who would handle homicides and other violent crimes in their overlapping jurisdictions.The bill would act as a response to the monthlong lag time between Kristin’s disappearance and the time the sheriff’sdepartment officially got involved in her search. Willie Guerrero, a spokesman for Senator Thompson, stated that the law creates a “minimum threshold” between law enforcement agencies and how they should handle the investigations of violent crimes on California’s college campuses.

Governor Pete Wilson signed House Assembly Bill (SB) 1729 on August 11, 1998. It is better known as the Kristin Smart Campus Safety Act.