Susan Smith: 20 years later, case still a shocker (She drove her kids into a lake) [View all]

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Susan Smith: 20 years later, case still a shocker

Investigators were so determined 20 years ago to get a confession from South Carolina’s Susan Smith that they were willing to use anything, including deception, to get her to admit to drowning her two small children in an Upstate lake.

Then-SLED chief Robert Stewart said this month that investigators created a copy of a false newspaper article they were prepared to show Smith about a woman who had killed a family member. The fictional woman served her time in prison, got out, married a rich businessman and went on to lead a happy life. The plan: let Smith read the article and then speak with the woman. If the shame of killing her children didn’t persuade Smith to confess, agents reasoned, perhaps hope would – hope that her life could go on beyond prison.

Not only was the article false, the woman was an undercover State Law Enforcement Division agent. Fortunately, Stewart said, Smith did confess, and investigators never had to use the scheme.

Stewart described the plan, which he has never discussed publicly, as the 20th anniversary of the case approaches. Others looking back on the Oct. 25 anniversary recall the media convergence on the small city of Union. They remember the stresses – and scrutiny – of the sudden national attention and the decisions they had to make to get through it all.

Stewart knew that if the case hinged on using deception, it would be just another tool that law enforcement had in its arsenal of coaxing confessions from alleged murderers. SLED and the Union County Sheriff’s Office already were receiving help from seasoned behavioral scientists and a veteran interviewer and polygraph analyst from the FBI.
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Much more: http://www.thestate.com/2014/10/18/3753690/susan-smith-20-years-later-case.html

An article from the former SC Director of Prisons about Smith:
http://www.thestate.com/2014/10/18/3753666/former-sc-prisons-director-susan.html

I lived about an hour away from Union when this happened. Most of us never believed her story about the carjacking. I wasn't sure exactly what happened, but I told someone they needed to look for the car in one of the quarries fairly near there.
I had read a book about Diane Downs who shot her kids. I didn't put it past Smith having done something because I had read that.
It was and is one of the most horrible crimes ever.