With Findlay, Susan finally believed she would be able to have some stability in her life but, she was mistaken. Brown or any other married man for that matter, you will lose your self-respect. Toms reaction was shock and he reiterated that the two would never have a sexual relationship again. "But like I have told you before,there are some things about you that aren't suited to me, and yes, I am speaking about your children. After picking up her children from nursery, she stopped to chat with a friend in a parking lot and expressed her fears about Tom's reaction now that he knew she had slept with his father. ``I know how you feel about our relationship and I respect that. Something went wrong and their Suburban rolled into the lake. The letter is a classic of its caddish kind; Findlay read it aloud in court. 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See the 'Counting On' Kids' Houses, Look How Much the Little Couple's Kids Will and Zoey Have Grown Up, Every Look From the Kardashian-Jenner Family at the 2021 Met Gala, Gabby Petito's Texts Show 'More and More Tension' With Brian Laundrie, 'Welcome to Plathville' Kim Plath's DUI Case Closed: Fine, More Details, Sister Wives Kody, Robyn Were With a Mystery Blonde: Identity Revealed, Megan Fox and MGK's Relationship Is 'Toxic': 'There Is Concern for Her', Farrah Abraham Slams Mom-Shamers Over Daughter Sophias Piercings, Jon Gosselin Is 'Open' With Kids Collin, Hannah About Their Dating Lives. A letter. She was also introduced to her boss's son, Tom Findlay. The first step is to understand the causes of climate change and how we can reduce our impact on the environment. SUSAN SMITH'S LETTER TO TOM FINDLAY Dear Tom, Just a note to say thank you for everything. But unfortunately, it wont be me. According to Findlay, Smith claimed: * that her husband was tapping her phone and having her followed; * that she had had an affair with Findlay's father; * that she made up the story of the affair with the elder Findlay to test his son's feelings for her; * that she was considering having an affair with the husband of a good friend; * that she had had an affair with Beverly Russell and David Smith was going to publicize it. . With the promotion came a new life for Susan. Chicago Tribune Smith and her husband, David Smith, filed for divorce in September 1994 and it was finalized in May 1995. Looking forward to reading more true crime articles by you. After Smith confessed, hundreds came to stand on the ramp, pray over that ground, throw flowers on the quiet surface of the lake and, later, touch the smooth granite monuments erected by the waterside. Susan Smith and Tom Findlay; the boyfriend After breaking up with David, Susan started working as a bookkeeper at the largest employer in the area, Conso Products. I could never express in words how much you mean to me. ``I want you to know that I have never felt with anyone, the way I feel when Im with you. Before she and David began to date, Susan told a psychiatrist, she had an affair with a store manager who was subsequently transferred out of town. 1000s of new photos added daily. Killing her sons was a horrifying act that bespeaks a personality crisis: at that moment, she must have been emotionally numb. Smith's mother and stepfather are still around. Then she drove out to John D. Long Lake and let her maroon Mazda Protege roll into the reddish-brown water. Recently, someone gave them a toy truck, a tiny plastic horse, two pinwheels (one for each brother), a plaster angel kneeling in prayer, a $2 bouquet of supermarket flowers and miniature wind chimes, left to tinkle softly in the country graveyard. Susan felt indebted to her mother and allowed her to dictate the rules. They made a point of showing jurors the videotaped interviews in which Smith tearfully maintained the kidnapping hoax. A team of state psychiatrists certified that Smith was competent to stand trial. ``Even though you think we have much in common, we are vastly different. Name: Susan Vaughan Smith D.O.B: September 26, 1971 Place of Birth: Union, South Carolina Parents: Linda & Harry Vaughan Conviction Date: July 22, 1995 Sentence: LIFE . I know I did when we were messing around earlier this year. However, when he began to learn more details of the story, he came to his senses. To be the perfect woman for a rich man. He told her he felt like some kind of pervert when it happened." In January 1994, Susan started dating a co-worker from her job at Conso Products Tom Findlay. Final testimony for the prosecution includes a tearful David Smith saying, 'All my hopes and dreams, everything that I had planned for the rest of my life-it ended that day. You are intelligent, beautiful, sensitive, understanding, and possess many other wonderful qualities that I and many other men appreciate. "A passing love affair," Halleck called it. And special thanks to my fellow true crime buffs in the True Crime Discussions group on FB, especially PAT! Ms. Smiths letter (handwritten, not dated): ``Just a note to say thank you for everything. During her trial, Susans stepfather, testified that he had sexually molested his stepdaughter when she was a teenager and again in the months leading up to her drowning the boys. The emerging facts of her chaotic life--her father's suicide, her molestation by her politically prominent stepfather, her failed marriage and the tabloid prurience of her repeated love affairs-seemed to make her a symbol of small-town decadence. Although prosecutors sought the death penalty, Susan was sentenced to life in prison. Susan had a troubled childhood, which was plagued with suicide attempts and traumatizing events. In the summer of 1988, Susan got a temporary job as a cashier at a local grocery store. On the weekend of Oct. 15, Tom invited Susan to his father's estate for a hot-tub party. I was not in my right mind.. The following year, prison captain. [2] After the first sentence, insert eyes rolling in parentheses. And a nation that has heard the squalid evidence about Smith's liaisons with four different men, including her own stepfather, voted 63 percent to 28 percent in a NEWSWEEK survey that she should have been put to death. He hired Smith as an assistant to his executive assistant in 1994, and she got to know his son while working at the Conso plant. Susan Leigh Smith (ne Vaughan; born September 26, 1971) is an American woman who was convicted of murdering her two sons, three-year-old Michael and 14-month-old Alexander, in 1994 by drowning them in a South Carolina lake. In her confession, she stated that she wanted to die and was going to her mothers house, but she gave up. Do you favor or oppose the death penalty for Timothy McVeigh if he is convicted of the bombing in Oklahoma City? Some are proud to belong to a community that refused to wither in the spotlight. State police investigator David Caldwell testified that Smith was first accused of killing her sons just a day after they disappeared. For nine days, she pleaded for the safe return of her babies while making appearances on television, only to have the true story later be revealed. But something was not right in their relationship, Susan was extremely materialistic and always borrowed money from her mother. Something went very wrong that night. I love writing and I also love criminal cases, nothing better than combining business with pleasure. Amazon ", Findlay delivered his response to Smith at work the next day, writing: "You are intelligent, beautiful, sensitive, understanding and possess many other wonderful qualities that I and many other men appreciate. But just dont get seriously involved with anyone until you have done the things in life that you want to do, first. He told her to keep it: Smith was wearing the shirt when she drove her sons to the lake that evening. This didnt seem to work, so she told him about the supposed affair with her boss, also Toms father, and warned him that the details of the relationship might come to light during the next few days. Tom Findlay, 28, is a graphic designer who works in his father's firm. Because I come from a place where everyone had the desire and the money to go to college, having the responsibility of children at such a young age is beyond my comprehension. ", This smarmy rejection threw Smith into panic. Tom, meanwhile, was trying to figure out how he would end his relationship with Susan. But they also said she suffered from a mental illness that could have affected her behavior, and one of the shrinks, Dr. Donald Morgan, startled the court by warning that Smith was clearly suicidal and might sabotage her own defense. On November 3, 1994, David and Susan appeared on the CBS This Morning program and David expressed his full support for Susan and her story about the kidnapping. Susan became pregnant and had an abortion. . ``It is 11:50 p.m. and I am getting very sleepy. When a place has been forced to defend itself before the eyes of the world, there is no road map for recovery. . ", Paul Patrick, a florist, says, "It was a real tragedy but I don't think anybody's still dwelling on it three years later. Or purchase a subscription for unlimited access to real news you can count on. And as for your relationship with B. CAPTION: Thomas Findlay, right, Susan Smith's former boyfriend, leaves courthouse. It was as if Bev had acquired the right to do whatever he wanted. . Susan stood by and watched until the car was completely submerged. "We'll never really be the same. In Northern California, side grafting wasnt very successful either. Have a tip? The case appeared tailor made for an ambitious young prosecutor like Tommy Pope, who rejected repeated suggestions that he let Smith plead guilty in return for life in prison. ``Thank you for being there for me through all the rough times. Besides, I want you to feel good about yourself, and I am afraid that if you sleep with B. ", Findlay went on to write: "Susan, I could really fall for you. . You will without a doubt make some lucky man a great wife. Due to a tumultuous marriage between her parents, full of aggression, they divorced when she was seven years old, and soon after, her father Harry, at the age of 37, committed suicide. After picking up her children from nursery, she stopped to chat with a friend in a parking lot and expressed her fears about Toms reaction now that he knew she had slept with his father. Other testimony pointed to the deep shame that stemmed from her incestuous relationship with Russell. Today on #CrimeStories: I can't get my head around it either! Take an eye for an eye, prosecutor Tommy Pope urged the jury. UNION, S.C. - Michael would have turned 6 last month, and Alex by now would be 4. UPDATE! And Susan Smith thought she had him hooked. I was a good mother, and I loved my boys. The steady drip of revelation, each more damning than the last, seemed almost certain to lead to her execution. The mom of two made headlines at the time of the news due to her shocking motive and she has since been behaving herself behind bars, which means she could soon be a free woman. . " "I'll never forget what Susan has done to me and my family, [and] I even have to say, to her family," Smith said. First, it is important to choose the right type of planter and support system for your plants. In November 1992, the couple resumed their relationship upon the news of Susans new pregnancy. "But forgive--that's something I'm going to have to deal with, I guess, further on down the road. Last summer, Tim and Angie Phillips came with their three small children and two family friends, one of them a 3-year-old. In fact, I think you should do just that. On Oct. 17, according to Findlay, Smith gave him a greeting card and a handwritten letter accepting their breakup with equanimity and pledging her eternal friendship, saying, "I will always love and care for you the rest of my life. She will be eligible for parole in 2025 when she is 53 years old. Russell published a book in 2000 titled My Daughter Susan Smith where she detailed her daughters rocky childhood and background in an attempt to understand and explain why she did what she did. Nearly 30 years after her conviction, Smith's cellmate is speaking out and . They still receive gifts. But on Oct. 16, Findlay testified, Smith acknowledged she was not even separated from her husband. Russell has not attended the trial but may be called as a witness. Patrick is in there. You are the best friend anyone could ever have. Michael and Alex Smith were buried together in the same casket in the Bogansville United Methodist Church cemetery on November 6, 1994, next to the grave of Davids brother and the childrens uncle, Danny Smith. Beverly Bev Russell, a successful local businessman. Nothing--not Smith's sad history or blighted hopes, nor any kind of victim chic-can explain that act away. The two had always proved to be good parents. Keep scrolling below to find out more about Susan Smiths case, trial and to find out where she is today. I do. At the lake where they died, a little girl from Monroe, N.C., left a stuffed scarecrow and a pumpkin made of cornhusks. In Touch Weekly is part of the a360media Entertainment Group.Copyright a360media 2023. After the interview, Susan met with Sheriff Wells for another questioning. From an early age Susan Smith lived in a troubled environment, in a wealthy family that was overly concerned with appearances. Follow me on Instagram down below. Susan was devastated by the end of her relationship with Tom. Miller saved videos of local newscasts and the Smiths' network interviews, and recently appeared in a Smith documentary for the Arts and Entertainment Network. "He was threatening to her. Everything is different except the gently rippled lake and its thick ring of trees. The marriage was a step up: Susan and her brothers, Michael and Scotty, moved into a comfortable ranch house in Mount Vernon Estates, an upscale subdivision outside Union. He said she slammed her hand down on the table, uttered a profanity and said, " I can't believe you think that!' But others, when they travel, won't say where they're from because they'd rather not answer questions. Her descent began with the divorce of her parents in 1977, when Susan was 6 years old. "That's one of the things that helped the healing process," says the Rev. Brackett is grateful for the fellowship that grew from the Smith case. As deeply depressed as she was that Tom had ended their relationship, she was still sexually involved with David - and with her step-father, Bev Russell. Despite the family turmoil, the child was long-awaited and loved. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. 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