During October of 1994, the country was held in suspense due to the vanishing of a 3-year-old child named Michael Smith and his younger brother Alexander, who was only 14 months old at that time.
Their mother Susan Smith had told police officers an alarming story: her vehicle had been taken by force from her while both these little ones were fastened inside it. For more than one week, she kept appearing on TV and making extreme requests, asking the person who supposedly carjacked her car to bring back her children unharmed.
But the horrible reality was that there had been no carjacking. In an astonishing confession, Susan Smith accepted that she intentionally allowed her vehicle to roll into a lake, a deed which resulted in drowning of these two boys while they were seated helplessly inside their respective car seats.
The country was fascinated by the case. People in general could not believe or understand how a mother could do such terrible things and then work so hard to hide it all.
Susan Smith said that she stopped her car at a stoplight in Union, South Carolina on the night of October 25, 1994. She claimed an armed black man approached and told her to get out of the vehicle before driving away with her sons still inside it. She quickly reported this supposed carjacking to police, which started a big search and rescue mission.
For the next nine days, Susan Smith kept appearing on national television and made emotional appeals towards the carjacker who remains unidentified. She spoke in a tragic way about her kids, begging for their safe comeback. “Whoever has my children that they please I mean please bring them home,” she said while crying.
But, what people don’t know yet is that the boys are already dead, their lifeless bodies hidden under the dark, murky water of John D. Long Lake. Smith planned her horrible scheme with careful thought and precision: she let her car glide slowly into the lake while having her two sons still strapped inside.
While the hunt progressed, investigators started to have doubts about Smith’s account. Recorded footage from surveillance cameras did not show any signs of a carjacking incident, and her sequence of events did not align correctly.
Authorities observed that she showed very little emotion when they were searching for her child, this was quite different from the sad mother she acted as in front of TV cameras.
In the end, she finally told the truth on November 3, 1994. After almost two weeks of lying, Susan Smith confessed to something unimaginable that she intentionally drowned her sons because she wanted to date a rich man from nearby who didn’t like having kids around.
The nation was in shock, trying to understand how a mother could do this crime and then make up such an elaborate story about it. Smith’s lie of a car theft had caught attention from the public which caused a big hunt but it turned out to be without results.
Post-event, Smith was found guilty of two murder charges and given life imprisonment. The jury, even though they couldn’t decide to give her death sentence, felt that her mental condition during the crime deserved lifetime incarceration.
Close to three decades later, Susan Smith’s chance for her initial parole is getting closer and the case still lingers in people awareness. The things she did stating that they were due to a mental collapse have become imprinted into the nation’s memory as sad memories about how low human wickedness can go.
The tale of Susan Smith’s attempted concealment for nine days is a traumatic one, displaying the extreme measures an individual can take to hide their most evil impulses. This case will remain eternally marked in American crime history as a story cautioning about the terrible outcomes that can result when love from a parent becomes twisted by desire.
