An Affair That Led to a Fatal Shooting
Pamela Smart was a 22-year-old high school media coordinator in 1990 when her affair with a 15-year-old boy resulted in the murder of her husband. Smart was sent behind bars and she has been serving life imprisonment for plotting the murder of her husband Gregory Smart with her teenage student, CNN reported. She has finally taken full responsibility for his death and her statement was videotaped as part of her latest request to reduce her sentence. In the video released by WMUR-TV on YouTube, Smart acknowledged that she had previously "deflected the blame" when it came to admitting her role in the murder of Gregory. Smart spoke about how she had reflected on the mistakes she made in the past and how she had changed throughout her 34-year-long incarceration. The video concluded with Smart requesting a meeting with New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu and the New Hampshire Executive Council.
The Affair
Smart married Gregory in 1989 and began working as a media coordinator at Winnacunnet High School soon after, The Washington Post reported. While serving as a facilitator for a school self-esteem program, she met a 15-year-old volunteer, William "Billy" Flynn. She said she eventually developed feelings for him and later in court, they both testified that they became lovers. Smart shared with the outlet that they began having sexual encounters somewhere around his 16th birthday.
The Murder
On May 1, 1990, Smart came back home from a school meeting to find her 24-year-old husband shot to death on their condo floor, PEOPLE reported. As the investigators dug deeper, they learned that Smart was having an affair with an underage student. Later when Flynn was put on trial, he admitted shooting Gregory but maintained that he did it at the direction of Smart. She continued to deny the allegation until her recent confession. Flynn pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and testified against her. Smart and Flynn were also aided in the crime by other teenage boys named Patrick "Pete" Randall, Vance Lattime Jr. and Raymond Fowler, Seacoastonline reported.
The Trial
Smart's trial was one of the first in America that was aired on television as TV cameras were allowed into the courtroom, WMUR reported. She continued to deny being aware of the murder and plotting it. However, Smart had previously confided in a teen intern who secretly recorded her after the murders and became a star witness in the trial. By then, Smart had publicly speculated that her husband's killer was "some jerk, some drug addict person looking for a quick 10 bucks." The New York Times reported.
The Verdict
Smart was arrested on August 1, 1990, in her office that was located across from the high school. On March 22, 1991, the jury convicted Smart of conspiring in the killing of her husband, being an accomplice to first-degree murder, and of witness tampering. Under the New Hampshire law, she was sentenced to life imprisonment, The Washington Post reported. Flynn was sentenced to 28 years to life in prison for Gregory's second-degree murder, WMUR reported. Randall got a 40-year life sentence which would later be reduced. The other two accomplices, Fowler and Lattime Jr., also received 15 and 18 years behind bars, respectively.
The Aftermath of The Trial
Smart studied and earned two master’s degrees while serving her sentence in Bedford Hills Correctional Facility, New York, The New York Times reported. She also tutored her fellow inmates, became an ordained minister, and is a part of an inmate liaison committee. “The death penalty would have been more merciful than this,” Smart wrote in an email that she had sent to a supporter, The New York Times reported. “Nothing will ever be enough for New Hampshire to say I am a human being deserving of anything more than being locked up in a cage like an animal for the rest of my entire life.” Smart's trial was one of the most publicized trials that turned into a media circus. Author Joyce Maynard wrote her 1992 book To Die For, drawing inspiration from Smart's case, CBS News reported. The book went on to inspire the 1995 movie with the same name starring Nicole Kidman and Joaquin Phoenix.
Smart's Admission to the Authority
Smart had made repeated appeals to reduce her sentence in the past and in a 2019 interview from the prison, she said that she would never admit to planning the murder, CBS Boston reported. However, that changed when she recently gave a statement that was made public on YouTube by WMUR-TV. Smart spoke with a quivering voice, revealing how she has begun to "dig deeper into her responsibility" while being involved with a writing group and how it has "encouraged her to go beyond and to spaces that she didn't want to be in. "Now that I am older and able to look back on things, I can see so many errors that I made, and see how skewed my judgment was, and how immature I was. Looking backward, you know, I'm such a different person than I was back then," she said in the raw video. "I mean, 34 years is a very long time and during that time I've done a lot of work on myself." Smart's last appeal to the state Supreme Court was dismissed in 2022, CBS News reported.
