Susan Smith: A Nightmare Behind Bars After Parole Denial

“But now she’s the complete opposite. Just rude and b—-y all the time. Overnight, she went from being a model prisoner to a complete nightmare.”

Alade-Ọrọ̀ Crow

January 30, 2025
6:51 pm

Susan Smith, known for the tragic drowning of her two sons, continues to stir controversy in prison months after a South Carolina panel denied her parole in late 2023.

As reported by CrimeOnline, at 53 years old, Smith is serving a life sentence for the 1994 crime where she drowned her sons in a lake.

Following the parole denial in November 2023, Smith has reportedly faced multiple disciplinary actions according to the New York Post.

“Last year, when she had a chance to be released, she was cooperative, helpful, and even pleasant,” said a Leath Correctional Institution employee to the Post.

“But now she’s the complete opposite. Just rude and b—-y all the time. Overnight, she went from being a model prisoner to a complete nightmare.”

In August, she was charged with communicating with a victim or witness of a crime after engaging with a documentary filmmaker, violating prison regulations. This incident occurred shortly after she stated on a phone call that she “wouldn’t talk” to the media.

This marked her first disciplinary action in nearly a decade; she was convicted of this charge on October 3, as confirmed by Chrysti Shain, director of communications for the South Carolina Department of Corrections, to Fox News Digital.

AP95070911061 — FILE – In a July 9, 1995 file photo, visitors walk down the ramp where Alex and Michael Smith were drowned in a car in 1994 in Union, S.C., by their mother, Susan Smith. Mothers kill their children in this country much more often than most people would realize by simply reading the headlines; by conservative estimates it happens every few days, at least 100 times a year. Experts say more mothers kill their children under 5 years of age than fathers. And, some say, our reluctance as a society to believe mothers would be capable of killing their offspring is hindering our ability to recognize warning signs, intervene and prevent more tragedies. (AP Photo/Lou Krasky, File)

At the time of the incident, Smith, aged 23 and a single mother, spent nine days in October 1994, pleading for help to find her two missing sons, Michael and Alexander.

She claimed that on the night her sons disappeared, a Black male approached her at a stoplight, forced her out of her red Mazda Protégé, and drove off with her children still inside.

However, on November 3, 1994, after a nationwide search and extensive investigation, Smith confessed that she had left her boys in her car, which subsequently rolled into the John D. Long Lake in Union County. Tragically, police discovered both children’s bodies inside the vehicle, around 60 feet from the shore.