Susan Smith

Susan Smith was born Susan Leigh Vaughan on September 26, 1971 in Union, South Carolina. She's the daughter of Linda and Harry Vaughan. Her biological father committed suicide when Susan was six years old. Smith first attempted suicide at age thirteen and was molested by her stepfather when she was a teenager. Following graduation from high school in 1989 she made a second attempt at suicide. In 1994 Susan drowned her sons Michael Daniel Smith and Alexander Tyler Smith by driving her car into a lake (Michael was only three years old while Alexander was a mere fourteen months old). When Smith reported the incident on October 25, 1994 to the authorities she claimed a black man had carjacked her automobile and driven off with the two boys still inside the car. Nine days after an intensive heavily publicized investigation and nationwide search Susan confessed that she had committed this heinous act so she could have a relationship with a wealthy local man who wasn't interested in having a family. Smith's crime was met with much contempt and revulsion by the American public who felt betrayed by her tearful initial attempts at eliciting sympathy by falsely stating that her sons had been abducted. She was convicted on two counts of murder on July 22, 1995 and placed in the Administrative Segregation Unit in the Women's Correctional Center in Columbia, South Carolina so she can serve a life sentence. Susan was then moved to the Leath Correctional Institution in South Carolina after two guards at the previous penitentiary admitted to having sex with her. Smith is eligible for possible parole on November 4, 2024.