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Nobody Should Believe Me
Case Files 14: Susan Smith and the Impact of False Accusations with Celisia Stanton
01:13:52
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- [00:00]
Andrea Dunlop
Foreign hello, it's Andrea and I've got a really fascinating Case Files episode for you today. This is a crossover with my friend Celicia Stanton, creator of the excellent podcast Truer Crime, which we will be sharing an episode of in the feed tomorrow. Today, Selesia and I are talking about the Susan Smith case, which touches on a bunch of themes that both of our shows cover. I love doing these crossover episodes with other shows, so let me know if there are other shows or creators that you think we should talk to. If you want to get in touch with us about that or anything else, give us a shout@helloobodyshouldbelieveme.com or you can leave us a comment on Spotify. We also appreciate ratings and reviews of the show on Apple Podcasts. And of course, if you want even more, nobody should believe me. You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Patreon and get two bonus episodes a month. Now with that, here's the show. Just a quick reminder that my new book, the Mother Next Medicine, Deception and Munchausen by Proxy is on sale right now wherever books are sold. The book was an Amazon Editor's Pick for nonfiction and the Seattle Times called it a riveting deep dive into mvp. And if you are an audiobook lover and you like hearing my voice, which I'm assuming you do since you're listening here, you should know that I narrate the audiobook as well. If you have already read the book, which I know so many of you have, thank you so much. Please let me know your thoughts and questions at hello and nobodyshouldbelieveme.com and we will bring my co author Detective Mike Weber on for a little book Q and A and post retirement. Tell all special thanks for your support.
- [01:46]
Celisia Stanton
Well friends, it's 2025. It's here.
- [01:49]
Andrea Dunlop
This year is going to be. Well, one thing it won't be is boring.
- [01:55]
Celisia Stanton
And that's about the only prediction I'm.
- [01:57]
Andrea Dunlop
Going to make right now.
- [01:58]
Celisia Stanton
But one piece of news that am.
- [02:00]
Andrea Dunlop
Excited to share is that the wait.
- [02:02]
Celisia Stanton
For my new book the Mother Next Door is almost over. It is coming at you on February 4th from St. Martin's Press.
- [02:10]
Andrea Dunlop
So soon.
- [02:11]
Celisia Stanton
I co authored this book with friend and beloved contributor of this show, Detective Mike Weber about three of the most impactful cases of his career. Even if you are one of the OG est of OG listeners to this show, I promise you are going to learn so many new and shocking details about the three cases we cover. We just go into so much more more depth on these stories and you're also going to learn a ton about Mike's story. Now I know y'all love Detective Mike because he gets his very own fan mail here at Nobody Should Believe Me. And if you've ever wondered how did Mike become the detective when it came to Munchausen by proxy cases, you are going to learn all about his origin story in this book. And I know we've got many audiobook listeners out there, so I am very excited to share with you. The audiobook is read by me, Andrea Dunlop, your humble narrator of this very show. I really loved getting to read this book and I'm so excited to share this with you. If you are able to pre order the book, doing so will really help us out. It will signal to our publisher that there is excitement about the book and it will also give us a shot at that all important bestseller list. And of course, if that's simply not in the budget right now, we get it. Books are not cheap. Library sales are also extremely important for books, so putting in a request at your local library is another way that you can help. So you can pre order the book right now in all formats at the link in our show notes. And if you are in Seattle or Fort Worth, Mike and I are doing live events the week of launch, which you can also find more information about at the link in our show notes. These events will be free to attend, but please do RSVP so that we can plan accordingly. See you out there.
- [03:49]
Andrea Dunlop
Well, hello Celisia. Thank you so much for being here. Really excited to talk about this case with you today. To start off with, can you tell us about your about your show, True or Crime?
- [04:03]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah. Well, I'm really excited to be able to chat with you today. My show, True or Crime, I actually created it just sort of as an outgrowth of my own personal experiences. In 2020, I actually, long story short, was defrauded of my life savings by a financial advisor who turned out he was defrauding all of his investor clients. He was actually a fiduciary, meaning he had like extra legal financial responsibilities. And he still chose to kind of use this for his own personal gain like vacations and homes and cars and things like that. And so that was obviously a super jarring experience for me. And after I had found out about this, like, you know, all my life savings was gone. He actually had stole over $2 million total from all of his clients. But after that I was kind of like, you know, navigating this whole criminal legal process and also just, you know, it was 2020, so there wasn't a lot going on. I. I've been a wedding and portrait photographer for many years. Winter in Minnesota during the pandemic, not a time of a lot of business. And so I was like, literally just binging true crime all day. It was kind of like a coping mechanism for dealing with this thing that I'd never kind of seen coming. And then sort of just constantly pausing those shows and complaining to my husband about things I felt like were missing from a lot of true crime narratives. Obviously, I found that this sort of listening to them interesting and engaging, and there was something that was really drawing me in for episode after EP episode. But I also felt like a lot of these shows really didn't dive into race or gender or sexuality or the root causes of. Of crime. And so I, you know, kind of just started having so many conversations with my husband about that that he was eventually like, why don't you start your own podcast? And I was like, yeah, like, I love that idea. Let me see if I can do it. Give it a try. And so that's how True or crime came to be. And I just produced that first season kind of independently put it out in the spring of 2021, and it really grew from there. And I lot of people also resonated with, like, wanting to hear true crime, you know, told a little bit differently with more nuance and empathy and just kind of like diving into, you know, why does. Why do these things happen? And so, you know, I've been working on the season two after that first season, and so that's 10, 10 additional episodes that, you know, we started releasing in January. And yeah, it's been an interesting ride. I'm excited to kind of continue and put out more episodes down the road.
- [06:36]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, well, you know, your show is excellent. I love it. And I love the way that you cover cases. And, you know, I have a similar relationship to the genre. Right. I got into it because of a personal experience and because I could not find the kind of content around that, the kind of information around that that I wanted, and that would have been helpful to me when I was going through it. So, yeah, so this story that we're going to talk about today, you know, we had gotten together and kind of brainstormed what is a good, truer crime, nobody should believe me crossover. And I think this one really fits the bill because I think it has just the elements that both of our shows are kind of focused on. So I'm just going to Do a quick recap of this case. So we're going to talk about the Susan Smith case. So this is a case from the mid-90s. A woman called. Called It Happens in Union county in South Carolina. So a woman named Susan Smith married to a man named David Smith. They got married quite young. When Susan Smith was 19, she gave birth to her first son, Michael, and then two years later, had her second son, Alex. And then on October 25, 1994, her children disappeared. And Susan Smith reported that she had been carjacked at night by a black man wearing a toboggan hat with a gun. And she told this story that he had carjacked her and then forced her out of the car and driven off with her two children strapped into their car seats in the back of the car. So investigators who were looking into this case, the sheriff's office in Union county, reportedly had some doubts about her story from the beginning. So. Yeah, so for the first week or so of this case, there was a ton of media attention. There was local, there was national, and there was this gigantic manhunt for the alleged kidnapper and this gigantic search for these two little boys. And the couple, Susan and David Smith, did a bunch of interviews. They did a morning show interview where they were pleading with the kidnapper to return their children. Now, Celisia, did you get a chance to watch any of that video of Susan and David Smith?
- [09:14]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, yeah, definitely. I feel like you never know how anyone would react in a situation like that. You know, everyone probably is a little bit different, but I think, you know, anybody could watch that and just feel like so much, you know, stress of, like, oh, my gosh, like, what had happened to these kids. And, you know, for these parents to kind of be without their kids is super alarming.
- [09:36]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. So really heartbreaking story, obviously. Like, easy to see why this really caught attention. And, yeah, I think as a parent, like, this is just your worst fear, right? Someone disappearing with your kids, anything happening to your kids. So I think anybody who's a parent, I mean, I think anybody who's a, you know, human being with a heart, but also, like, in particular parents, this just, like, gets such a visceral fear that, like, you can see why this had. Why this had such a big reaction. So as this is going on, as this massive manhunt is going on, investigators are talking to both of the parents and, you know, like, unfortunately, statistically, if something bad happens to children, it is most likely to be their parents or a family member. The whole stranger danger thing is, you Know, which. I don't know how old you are, Celicia, but I was born in the early. In the early 80s. So it's like, that was kind of like, peak, like, 80s and 90s was like, stranger danger. Like, someone's gonna drive up in a van and snatch you. So I was still, like, this was probably still within that cultural context of, like, a lot of attention to how dangerous strangers could be to children and not a lot of attention to how dangerous parents could be to children.
- [10:47]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, yeah, definitely. And I think, you know, it just in general, I feel like there's so many true crime stories that come out of the 90s that are especially, like, really, you know, well known that folks are talking about. I mean, I think about, like, also JonBenet Ramsey happening in this kind of similar era. This is actually in 1994, is the year before I was born. So, you know, like, I don't have, like, a ton of memories of this time, but just being in the true crime space, it's like, yeah, there's so many stories kind of like this. And I think, you know, I think of even in Minnesota, you know, we have the Jacob Wetterling case. I'm not sure if you're familiar with that one, but, you know, and that this. This happened before, before the 90s. But, you know, it was just like a time where I feel like it was like, oh, my gosh, like something could happen to your kids, like a stranger could come out of nowhere and just take them. And I think that created, you know, a lot of. A lot of panic.
- [11:36]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, absolutely. And, yeah, so basically, you know, as this. As these, like, pleas to the media are happening, and she's doing, you know, Susan Smith does a number of interviews. The investigators are looking closely at the parents, right, to see if they know anything about what happened. And Susan Smith's story about the carjacking just basically, completely falls apart. There's a ton of holes in it. The friend that she said she was going to visit wasn't actually home that night. The car was nowhere to be found in this gigantic, gigantic search. The. There was an issue with the traffic light where she said she was stopped at a traffic light when the carjacker, you know, approached her and got in the car and put a gun to her side. But there would not have been a red light unless there were any other cars at the intersection. Then she claimed she was at a different intersection, and there was actually a patrol car that had been nearby that intersection. So just nothing really added up. And they gave her A lie detector test. And she had trouble answering the question, do you know where your boys are? So lie detector tests, like, from my understanding of, you know, having talked to law enforcement about them, sort of tricky. They're not actually admissible in court. But obviously, along with the holes in her story and the fact that they could find no evidence of the car of this alleged carjacker really, you know, led them to believe that she was lying. And sure enough, under pressure, she confesses to driving her two sons into a lake. So obviously, so horrific. And I have to say, like. And it's funny, I'm. I'm now, like, interested in, like, what you sort of observed about her when she was doing those interviews in that interim time. Right. And it's. It's hard because knowing the outcome, I think you can kind of project onto that person of, like, oh, this seems really off. Like, I don't know if that would seem off to me if I didn't know that. But. But she did seem like, next to her husband particular, like, her husband looks genuinely shattered. And like, Susan just looks kind of blank. And then when she's giving an interview by herself to some TV cameras, she's almost kind of like, half smiling. And I wouldn't want to read too much into just that. Right. Because I think people do act weird when they are in states of shock, when they are experiencing grief. Like, I think you can't. It's kind of like it reminds me of that whole, like, Amanda Knox case case, you know, where people were like, well, she did a cartwheel and it was like, made this big thing. And, you know, she was acting like she was smooching her boyfriend or whatever. And it's like, well, yeah, people, like, act weird under stress.
- [14:20]
Celisia Stanton
That.
- [14:20]
Andrea Dunlop
That alone is not evidence of anything. But I have to say, like, looking at her and just kind of like looking at her eyes and looking at her facial expressions. She did seem very flat to me in those interviews.
- [14:31]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah. Yeah. And I think for me, like, I think that obviously, you know, knowing what we know now, there is something to the way that she's reacting to things. Like, it's just true, Right. If you're. If it's like, you can watch it back and be like, oh, she seems kind of flat or. Or maybe she seems like she's kind of smiling in some of those. That probably is happening to some extent because we know how the story ends. But I think for me, I always, like, when I was. When I watch those sorts of videos, I, like, really just don't know what to think of them usually, because I feel like any sort of, like, assumption that I'd have about how somebody should react could be incorrect. I think the Amanda Knox case is a great example. I also think about, like, Darlie Roudier, you know, she was accused of killing her children. She's in prison actually now for killing two of her kids. And I covered that case, actually for the first episode of True Crime. And one of the things that really stood out to me about her case and just sort of the media frenzy before the trial and during the trial was that there was so much attention placed on how she was reacting to things. It was like, you know, for example, she. Her son, one of her sons who had been killed, his birthday was, like, a few days after the murder. And so they. Her and a bunch of family members had gone out to his grave or a few days after the funeral, I should say, they'd gone out to his grave and they, like, had, you know, had, I think, cake and balloons and things like that and, like, had saying happy birthday and, like, had kind of, like, put up some confetti and things like that. And the media had gotten some of that on film, and it was just everywhere. I was like, oh, wow, you know, woman dances on her son's grave. That was the, you know, the headline. Which, to me, I was like, oh, that's so odd, because not only did I not, you know, think it was that weird, but I'm like, it. You know, beyond that, it's just like everyone reacts differently. But also it's like, it. To me, it did seem a little bit normal. It's like, you know, you want to try to celebrate the life of. Of this person that, you know, her and her family deeply loved, and also her family was there, too. So for me, that case really just being early in sort of my own journey of true crime media kind of solidified this idea of like. Like, I don't know how anyone's going to react. I don't know how to interpret it. I'm certainly not an expert in that. I have undergrad degree in psychology, and. And so, you know, I could pretend I know a thing or two, but really, that's just me. I. I would just, like, utilize my abnormal psych class to try to diagnose my friends, but I have no credentials. But, yeah, so I don't. I don't know. Like, I'm sure there is something to how she was reacting because we know that she, you know, was responsible, but I. I don't know how to read into it myself.
- [17:04]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. And I certainly agree with you that it's not something you would want to read too much into, because I think it can only tell you so much. And I also think that it's really interesting to look at how the media treats female suspects or female offenders and then especially if that. If that woman is a mom. Because I know this as. As a mom in the world, you know, incredibly judgmental of moms. Right. And how they handle everything. And so you really get this, like, you know, either they're like sort of saint or sinner thing, right? Yeah. It's like you wouldn't want to parse too much just based on facial expression or just seems like she's off, you know, like, I would be off too, if I had. If my children were missing. Like, I don't know what. I don't know how I would read on camera. You know, I think why it intrigued me is because I think a lot about liars and how they compartmentalize. Because the offenders that I cover, and I mean, this is true across, like, a lot of. Of types of offenders. But, you know, it is that deception piece. Right. Of, like, how you can go on camera and say those things while simultaneously knowing the reality. Right. And, you know, I was talking to, actually, a psychologist colleague about this yesterday, about why it seems like, you know, some of the offenders that we deal with are telling the truth when they're not. Right. Where it just doesn't necessarily read like they're lying when they are lying. And she talked about how, you know, people in this sort of area, and I think we can talk about sort of like the mental health aspects of this with Susan Smith, but that, like, if you are, you know, have these types of personality disorders that cause people to do these things that you're much, much more adept at compartmentalization. Right. And I sort of like, I think that was just what was in my mind watching her. I'm like, I think it's just such a trip to sort of watch someone making this appeal and making this big story up about, you know, a black man carjacking her when she knows the truth.
- [19:10]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah. You know, that actually, that's interesting that you kind of mentioned that because, well, it's almost like you would think it'd be the opposite. Like somebody who is a really adept liar or perhaps has some kind of like, personality disorder or whatever that, like, you know, is. Is somehow related to this crime that they've committed or these actions they've taken, you almost think that, like, they would be able to like, sort of dis. If they compartmentalize so well, deceive people, like, pretty well. And versus it being something that we can, like, kind of pull out and tease out, which is, I think what a lot of us like to do. Listening to true crime is like, okay, maybe if I listen to this911 call or I watch that video, then I'm, you know, I can kind of tell based on my gut feeling. But it does also remind me of my own experience just working with the financial advisor who had defrauded me and was defrauding all of. All of his clients. You know, we didn't have one of those relationships where it was like, oh, you would, you know, you talk to them like, once a year. Like, he was very involved with his clients and kind of just like helping with sort of financial health broadly. And so I would actually met with him. I don't remember if it was every week or every other week, but, like, consistently. And so it was so interesting, like, in retrospect, because, you know, we would get on these calls and, you know, we would, like, talk about, you know, our pets, or you'd ask about my. My husband or, you know, we. I remember the election. One of the elect. The, you know, 2020 election was happening at the time, so we would be talking about that. And all the. All the while, he knows what he's doing. He's. No, he knows. He's like. Like stealing all of this money. And he's not just having these conversations with me. He's having the conversations with all of his victims who I would eventually go on to, like, meet a good number of them just through that whole criminal legal process. And, you know, I think obviously everybody trusted him or they wouldn't have invested their money with him. And it's just so interesting to think. Like, I definitely believe he had to have had a major amount of compartmentalization going on. And I also think he thought, oh, well, I'll pay the money back. Like, it'll work out. Like, I think he was delusional enough to believe that this was all going to be okay. And so, yeah, just kind of an interesting. An interesting connection there.
- [21:09]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. And like, the. The rationalization and justification of, like, oh, I'll find a way to, like, you know, make good on all this. And I'm not actually screwing over these people. And I'm just, you know, whatever. Whatever it is, he was sort of telling himself about what he was doing.
- [21:22]
Celisia Stanton
Right.
- [21:22]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. So Susan Smith ends up submitting a handwritten confession that she had killed these Two boys. And this story changes as she goes. So initially, she said that this was an attempted murder suicide where she had meant to go into the car and drive into the lake with the two boys because she was suicidal, because she had been having an affair with her boss's son at the, I believe, factory where she worked, and that he had broken up with her. And so her justification for this was that that she wanted to kill herself, and she didn't want her boys to grow up without a mom, so she decided to take them with her. And this was debunked once they found the car and did the sort of forensics on how long it would have taken. And this is a really heartbreaking detail that she had put the car in neutral and it had rolled down the hill with a boy strapped into their car seats in the back. And that would have taken, like, a full. Because it was not like. Like speeding into the lake that it would have taken a full six minutes for the car to sink. And so I think that is. That definitely paints a picture of someone who is not, you know, who did not make any attempt to save the children or did not probably jump out of the car at the last minute. And also, I think a detail that really struck me was that she had photo albums and her wedding dress in the car with them. So it was really seemed like this sort of symbolic sending her old life into the lake move. And then it was revealed that the reason that her lover that she was having an affair with had broken things off was because he didn't want children. And. Yeah, I mean, like, how did these details of what actually happened in this case kind of land on you?
- [23:27]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, I mean, this obviously super tragic, upsetting, upsetting case. And I think what's interesting, too, about, you know, this, you know, affair that she was having with this guy and him wanting to cut it off because he didn't want to have children or didn't want to be, you know, assume any kind of responsibility for her children. Kind of makes it feel like, you know, this story about, oh, I'm gonna take my own life. It's really about maybe she's, you know, kind of delusional enough to believe, oh, I can't can get rid of my old life and then enter into this new life, and then I don't have children anymore, so there's no baggage, there's no problem for this, you know, guy to then start the. Restart this relationship with me, which doesn't actually make any sense. Right. Like, even putting her wedding dress and the photo and the photo albums in the car doesn't make sense, because at some point they're going to come across this car and they're going to be like, why is this in here? Right. So, like, I think it kind of speaks to what we had already said about the sort of, like, delusion and compartmentalization that had to have been happening. Um, but I also think it's interesting that she didn't kind of come clean. Even now, it sounds like she's sort of lying. Even after she's admitted to it, she's lying about, you know, what her intentions were. You know, maybe she's hoping to garner some sympathy or something like that. But, you know, it's just. It's really upsetting because you would hope that at the point that, all right, I've done it, she could at least, you know, be honest about why.
- [24:51]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. And, I mean, it definitely strikes me as, like. And not delusional in the sense that she's suffering from, like, actual delusions or psychosis, but sort of a. Yeah. Like, disordered way of thinking. Right. Where it's just like, oh, well, yeah, let me solve the problem by getting rid of my children and getting rid of my old life, and then this person will want me back. And I think, you know, she had. One of the things, I think, that really worked against any defense about, you know, mental health or anything about it being not premeditated was that she had told family members that she had sort of, like, fantasized about what if she hadn't had kids so young? And so I think there was some evidence that she had been sort of felt as though she was, like, trapped in that. In that situation. So she's arrested and the car is pulled out of the lake. Again, just so shattering for the father, shattering for the family members, and really for the whole community, because I think, especially when there's this, you know, there was this massive manhunt and, like, massive amount of resources dedicated to finding these boys. So you can imagine that people really felt a sense of betrayal when they found out who had been responsible for it. And then there's this additional element of her blaming a fictional black perpetrator, and that this had really caused some tension and some fear within the community. Are they going to find someone that fits that sort of general description and hold them accountable for it and, you know, when there was, like, no such person even sort of on the scene and. Yeah, I mean, that really, like, watching some of those interviews with the community members and how that had affected them. Yeah, that Just really struck me. And of course this goes back to some like very, very age old biases and very, very dark history of white women accusing black men of crimes.
- [27:02]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, I think what's interesting to me about, you know, her accusation. Well, actually, you know, they, they did it. They ended up doing a police sketch based on her description of, of this perpetrator. And you know, folks can look it up online. It's. It's a pretty generic, It's a side profile, which is interesting. And it's just kind of a pretty generic, you know, looking guy. He's wearing a cap like it doesn't look like there's nothing about him that I think is like, oh, this is like super distinguishing. Right? And then also there was like kind of, you know, descriptions circulating in the media. And one of them said that they were looking for a black man in the, in his 30s or 40s, five, nine to six foot tall. And he was wearing a shirt, blue jeans and a knit cap, Gap. And I'm like, how many people could that description possibly have matched? Like so many people. And so that means there's potentially, you know, so many black folks, black men in that area who are potentially being, you know, called in about or accused or you know, kind of are on, you know, on high alert because they might be accused of having executed this crime. And police actually said that they received thousands of ticks tips, you know, in the. There was such a media frenzy around this, you know, and they were on TV so much and it was in all the papers that they received so many tips. And you gotta imagine that, well, literally all of the tips were incorrect since she did it herself. And you just kind of have to wonder about those individual stories too. The, the people who were maybe like called in by their neighbor or person walking across the street or however it may be. And so that to me is, is like super disturbing. And I remember I actually covered this case on like a just like short tick tock that I did a few. And one of the things that kind of stood out to me when I was looking into the story was just like nobody was really focused on this angle of like she had accused somebody that didn't exist. She had made up a fictional character, and there are real lives impacted by that. So I just thought that was kind of an interesting part of it was that, you know, this case got so much attention, but that angle of it was so sort of like overlooked, you know, in the aftermath of her confession.
- [29:14]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, absolutely. I just sort of think about how badly this case could have gone if they had acted on those tips. I mean, I don't. I don't think that's implausible. I mean, I think her story didn't make a lot of sense, but I know that the way that a lot of times law enforcement looks at especially white but, like, young female offenders, they very easily, I think, could have sort of looked at her and been like, well, this lady would never kill her children, so let's keep looking for, you know, the fictional perpetrator and. And could have pinned it on someone.
- [29:52]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, I think it's interesting too, because it's like there are so many cases that when you hear them, they sort of like, defy logic. It's like, how could that even have even been possible? And I feel like I have such little faith in, you know, the criminal legal process just from, you know, just covering enough stories that it's like somewhere something like this has happened, I'm sure. And, you know, somebody has, you know, been pursued in this same dynamic of maybe a white woman accusing a black person that didn't exist. And then, you know, you have other kind of similar cases. I know that, you know, one case I'd covered this season on True Crime was the case of Alice Siebold, the author of the Lovely Bones, and Anthony Broadwater, who was the man who was convicted of her rape. She was raped when she was in college, and she had identified him on the street just a few months after her attack. And then Anthony was, you know, put to trial and ultimately convicted. He served 16 and a half years in prison. And it. We just found out in just the last few years that he was actually wrongfully convicted. And in that case, you know, it's a little bit different because Alice Sebold was actually attacked. She just misidentified her perpetrator. But, like, I think there was so many holes in that in that case as well, insofar as, like, you know, for example, Alice was presented a lineup that included Anthony Broadwater and a bunch of other people, and she didn't pick the right person or she didn't pick Anthony, I should say. She picked a different person out of the lineup. So red flag number one, right? That maybe she's. She's misidentified Anthony, and there's a number of sort of other things like that. But, you know, it goes to trial, she. She sits up on the witness stand, she points him out when she's asked to, like, you know, point to the. The perpetrator. And she's given a lot of sympathy and sort of like, can just sort of paper over the things that they don't want to believe, you know, are red flags in order to kind of like get to justice. And I think a lot of times too, it's not always an instance of like, just in general, whenever there's misconduct with policing or anything like that. I don't think it's always or even often that there's like a willful intent to railroad somebody. Oftentimes it's like just feeding into whatever biases you already have. It is, you know, not taking the time to actually do things properly. And so when you have this feeling of like, okay, well, my job is to get justice, here we go. We have somebody who, who looks like they could be the perpetrator. Sure. Let's, you know, sign seal delivered. They could be the one that we convict and send to prison. And I think that that's kind of interesting that it's like, we do have to kind of consider these biases when we're examining these cases because it can allow for innocent people to sort of be wrapped up in, you know, just a narrative that feels familiar to us even if it's not true and even if it's obviously not true.
- [32:41]
Andrea Dunlop
I'm a mom on the go in my 40s. I'm writing books, I'm making this show, I'm going down Internet rabbit holes. And given the fact that mornings with a six and a two year old are a complete opera of chaos, I do not have a lot of time to think about what to wear. I want things to be simple and I want them to be really nice, which is why at least half of my wardrobe these days is from Quints. Real talk. I love this brand so much and I know so many people who are fans. My friend April loves this brand. My producer Mariah loves it. My husband, my mom, they are all super into quints. And you can pretty much build a complete wardrobe from Quint. With their luxury essentials at affordable prices. Quint offers a range of high quality items at prices within reach, like their 100% Mongolian cashmere sweaters that start at $50. Their washable silk tops, which I love for travel dresses, organic cotton sweaters, and even 14 karat gold jewelry. Jewelry. All of the Items are priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. And you can feel great about shopping with Quince because they only work with factories that use safe, ethical and responsible manufacturing practices and premium fabrics and finishes. I love that. So give yourself the luxury you deserve with quince. Go to quince.com believe for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com believe to get free shipping and 300 day returns quints.com believe we'll include that information at the link in our show notes. And remember that shopping with our sponsors is a great way to support the show as we get into spring and summer. Whether you're going on hikes, walking dogs or just running after your children who definitely do not want to come inside while the sun is still up, you are going to get sweaty. And that's why you need Lumi Deodorant. If you've listened to our recent season five mailbag episode, you will know that we ended up doing an impromptu ad for Lumi because that is how much not only I but the whole Nobody should believe me team loves this product. And most of the team actually lives in Texas, so you know their deodorant is working extra hard. Lumi was created by an OB GYN who saw firsthand how normal BO was being misdiagnosed and mistreated. And Lum goes beyond a simple swipe to the pits. They have the number one whole body deodorant on the market because, let's face it, other stuff can also get stinky. Lumi's Starter Pack is perfect for new customers. It comes with a solid stick deodorant, cream tube deodorant and two free products of your choice like their mini body wash or deodorant wipes, which are my personal favorite. And it includes free shipping as a special offer for listeners. New customers get 15% off all Lume products with our exclusive code. And if you combine this 15% with the already discounted starter pack, that equals over 40% off their starter Starter Pack. So use the code Nobody for 15 off your first purchase@lumideodorant.com that's code Nobody at L U M E D E o d o R-A-N-T.com and please support the show by telling them that we sent you. All that info is at the link in the show notes. So stay fresher, stay drier and boost your confidence from head to toe with Lumi. So she's arrested and you know this goes to trial. Susan's Smith's main defense, you know at this point there's no question of who did what, right? It's, it's pretty clear cut. So her main defense is her mental health and there becomes a lot of focus on her mental health and also A past history of abuse. And so this is a really disturbing part of the story. Susan Smith was abused by her stepfather. I have to say, listening to the news coverage of this from the 90s, I was very struck by some of the language they used around that, you know, that they said this relationship had started off as abusive and then become consensual when she came of age. And I was like, yeah, that's not really how I would. That's not really how I would describe a relationship even with an adult person and their stepfather. So that obviously is very. Is very upsetting and a very, you know, sad thing that had happened to her. And also that is not a reason to murder your children. And I think, like, it gets very tricky with these conversations around mental health and culpability, which is, you know, very central topics of what we talk about on my show. And I think it was interesting the way that they sort of positioned her as, you know, being suicidal, being, you know, not in a right state of mind. And I think, you know, and having, you know, major, like, major depression. And there's a lot of danger actually talking about those things in the context of a crime without proper context, because then you're like, well, a lot of people are depressed, a lot of people are suicidal. A lot of people have trauma histories and they're not dangerous to other people.
- [37:42]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, I think, you know, in general, everyone has to be held accountable for the actions that they take in life. Right. And one of the things that I always. A quote that always kind of comes to mind for me is that no one ever enters violence for the first time having committed it. Meaning that, you know, we are all things experience it before we are going to be the perpetrator of it. And I think that's sort of what you. You're seeing here. Right. She has these sort of traumas. And you would expect anybody who would do something this horrendous probably has some sort of trauma or experiences that have shaped, you know, their lives to this point that have, like, kind of allowed them to make this decision. But that's separate, of course, from accountability for the things that you've done and you. And, you know, just wanting to be invested in. In kind of growing from those things because, yeah, like you said, not everybody goes on to commit horrendous acts of violence towards people, you know, you love and care about too. But I think that, like, what is interesting about the trauma that she experiences, that anybody experience, any sort of, like, perpetrator has experiences, I think it's in those Spaces, like, when we take the time to kind of learn, okay, what led to this, that we can kind of think more broadly about prevention in our society and in our communities. So it's like, for me, I think it is an important conversation to have about, you know, her mental health, her experiences with her stepfather, you know, the assault that she had experienced, and to analyze how the media was covering it. Kind of like you were saying, that's sort of problematic as well, but not necessarily to give her leniency so much as to be like, how do we create a safer society where less people do this sort of thing? Right? How can we create a more safe environment for children and young women, you know, who might be experiencing something similar to what Susan Smith was experiencing? And so I think it is an important conversation, but definitely it sometimes gets conflated with, like, okay, well, now, you know, what are we supposed to do? Just kind of like, let. Let them off? And of course not.
- [39:43]
Andrea Dunlop
So, yeah, and it's. It's an interesting question with, like, you know, both the nature and nurture of people who go on to do violent things and then, you know, and then the matter of culpable. And it's just interesting to sort of tease out. I think people do have this lens, and this is something I get asked about a lot, right? Like, do these perpetrators, like the perpetrators we cover on my show, all have histories of abuse? Do they have, like. I think people have this archetype in their head of, like, people who go on to do, you know, really horrendous acts, must have been, you know, abused themselves and kept in a box and, you know, whatever it is, and sort of experience, had these horrifying experiences as children. And, you know, there is some correlation between, like, the ACE score, you know, that an adverse childhood experience, there certainly can be, like, a cycle of abuse, right, where people are abused when they're children, and then they go on to. And to be violent to their own children. However, it's very like, there's a lot of, like, really kind of complex interplay of different things there. And also it's true that people who are, you know, who have high ACE scores, one of the things we know for sure is that they are much more likely to go on to be the victim of crimes. Right? And I think, like, the reason Susan Smith feels like such a sort of familiar offender to me, I think, is this element of, you know, when you. When you look at sort of like, her. Her past, that she has, you know, a lot of deception, a lot of apparently, like, Pretty compulsive behaviors. You know, she's having a fake shares with several men and I think the way they framed her sexuality is like a whole other conversation that we can also have. Because I think that was part of the reason that the sort of media leaned into this sort of salacious, you know, kind of like evil sex pot trope that they got going with her. But you know, she does, she does have these things that are very, you know, common with like the female offenders that I look at. So, you know, the female offenders I look at, they have all kinds of different childhoods. So they have, you know, some of them have abusive backgrounds. It's just unfortunately child abuse is pretty common. So that like is, you know, that shows up in that population population. There are people that just had kind of like medium shitty parents, you know, just like kind of stressed out absent parents, just. But like, but like nothing like, you know, super notable. And then there are people that have really nice childhoods that come from upper middle class backgrounds that have, you know, and again, we don't know, you know, different people can experience different things different ways and different things can be sort of traumatic that might not appear that way, or you don't know everything that's happened to a person. But with all that said, nothing obvious, right? Like, no obvious history of trauma, um, you know, no obvious history of like distress as a child. And so then that sort of leads me to, well, then what, what is, what is the cause? And I understand the pitfalls of sort of thinking like, oh, some people are just born bad, but I do think that some people are born and develop no empathy. And I think that makes someone dangerous. And I think when you look at someone who could commit this type of crime, you have to sort of put yourself as uncomfortable it is like you have to kind of like put yourself in her shoes and just be like, like think of all the things and the ways and the reasons that you would stop yourself from committing something like that. And I really think like, in terms of like, is Susan Smith dangerous? Because that was part of kind of what her, you know, her trial team and understandable, right? And everyone's entitled to their, to defense in court and a fair trial and all of that. And I'm not saying that we shouldn't have those things, but I think there was this effort to present her and even then we can talk about sort of throughout the appeal process as like not a danger to society. And so I think somebody who's not able to empathize with their children, I can't think of a more dangerous person. And then it's sort of like, well, could she have sort of been that person, but just abandoned her kids instead of murdering them? Then it's sort of like, where does someone get sort of pushed into the line of being capable of that kind of violence rather than just like, you know, I don't really feel like being a mom anymore. Like, I'm gonna get out of here, you know.
- [43:43]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, I don't know like too much about like the actual, you know, like, science side of this in terms of like the specific disorders or conditions that like, would lead someone to not have empathy. This is very anecdotal, but I follow this one girl on TikTok who like self identifies as a psychopath. And she. She like talks about, you know, how she doesn't feel empathy, you know, for her friends and all of this, and sort of just answers all the. A lot of questions about like, what her experience is like. I think there's also like a few books too, that folks have written who, you know, from that perspective and experience. I think it's interesting because I think, you know, like, most people in general do not go on to murder anybody. You know, it's extremely hard to kill somebody, regardless, even if you don't have empathy for your children. It's like you have self preservation. And in fact, like, at least this one girl kind of talks about how, you know, a lot of what would motivate her not to harm, you know, somebody if she ever felt like, extremely angry or something. That would be like her own self preservation, which is its own safeguard in a way. So I don't know if I'm like, okay, like inherently it always is going to be like, you know, dangerous. Because I do think that there are ways in which, you know, that could be treated. Like, she kind of talks about how she, you know, has specific therapy. I think there's also another. Another creator too, who's a kind of. Does similar work, kind of educating folks on his experience. You know, he calls himself a psychopath. I think there's a technical term for it.
- [45:12]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, I think it's antisocial personality disorder is the DSM diagnosis. Yeah.
- [45:17]
Celisia Stanton
And what's interesting too about this one woman who I was talking about, she kind of says that most of her friends wouldn't really know unless she had told them. Um, she talks about, like, how one of the things that makes her really sad, like, because she'll be like, oh, you know, I come on here, I tell you All I'm a psychopath. And then I'm like crying. And you're like, well, I thought you couldn't feel emotions. Why are you crying? Like, what is it about? And she's kind of saying, you know, she feels sad for herself that she doesn't get to experience some of these emotions that, you know, she gets to see on TV or her friends and family are experiencing, like love and, and care and all of that. And that that's a really difficult experience. And so that's why the risk taking behavior is to try to be like, okay, maybe then I can feel something or what if I never end up falling in love? Like, that's a big existential fear that she has. And so it kind of just makes me think about how, yeah, certainly there's like, maybe like a dangerous element to these things, but these are also people like, needing support in some way. And it's like, that's why these conversations are important because it's like we don't really have the popular sort of knowledge and also just like the supports in our society to make sure that those folks are kind of taken care of. So it doesn't escalate to a point. Like what you're seeing happening in the Susan Smith case, for example.
- [46:34]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's all really valid. I mean, I think, and I, I've watched this creator's videos as well, and they are, they are fascinating and I admire, you know, that creator and that they seek treatment and that they know that they have to, you know, that they know that they need that help in order to, to not, you know, act on impulses that are going to be harmful to others. And I think I have thought a lot about this as I've looked at, you know, a lot of the cases that I unravel, because certainly, like the people that not, not every person who commits this abuse, I think would, would fall into this category, but certainly the people who are on the extreme end of Munchausen by proxy perpetrators where they are smothering their children, poisoning their children, like, you know, really torturing them, like putting their life constantly at risk, that is not a person who's feeling a bond to their child and that's not a person who's empathizing with their child. Right. Like, that's obviously an incredibly destructive behavior. And I do think actually about how lonely it is because they're creating, you know, a fake world that they have everyone else sort of like on the hook and manipulated. And I think there's evidence that you Know, Susan Smith had some of that going on, right? When you have like multiple affairs and you're sort of keeping this like, like, you know, kind of whole, whole facade going. And I just think like, you know, I have two children and like my bond with them is the most special thing in the entire world. And like I would, I would, you know, I would do, do anything to protect them. And that's a very rewarding bond. And then, but even you know, for people who don't have children, right? Like our connections with other people, to me, like that's what makes life worth living, right? Like that's, that's what makes it like connection with other people, connection with your community, connections with your friends, your family, you know, co workers, just human, the basics of human interaction and feeling like a bonded to other people. I can't imagine a life without that. And if you weren't capable of feeling that, that is deeply, deeply sad. And I think it makes sense that tie to the risk taking behaviors and you could see like if you're not capable of like recognizing that another person is a person and like feeling that two way bond and you feel like you have to lie about everything, then it would be really hard to get your emotional needs met. Right?
- [48:42]
Celisia Stanton
Mm. Yeah, no, definitely, definitely. Do we know if Susan Smith, like, if they had her like assessed or anything like that for the trial?
- [48:51]
Andrea Dunlop
So yeah, so this was in February of 1995. So this is in the lead up to her trial. Susan Smith's defense attorneys hired a team of psychiatrists led by a guy called Seymour Halleck to conduct a psychiatric evaluation of her. So she was interviewed by him for 15 hours over the course of four sessions. This is according to WYFF News 4, who was the local station in union that covered this case. And the opinion given by that psychiatrist was that Susan Smith did not suffer from a deep depression and he diagnosed her as having a dependent personality disorder. The quote from him they include here is she constantly needs affection and becomes terrified she will be left alone. And he found that Susan's Smith was only depressed when she was alone. So it sounds like the prosecution also ordered a psychiatric evaluation, but it doesn't say anything about their results. But I think the fact that the defense did not find her to be suffering from major depressive disorder is telling. Right, because they were sort of the team that was hired to, I'd imagine the goal there was to give some kind of justification for her actions, some kind of defense. I mean that was really all they had to work with was her mental Health. I don't know anything, anything about a dependent personality disorder. It's also possible that it's called something different because this was, you know, 30 years ago. But. But yeah, I mean, I think that really sort of does away with a mental health reasoning that would lessen her culpability because it's worth saying, you know, and this is something we talk about on the show, that parents do harm their children sometimes because they are having a psychotic episode or because they are suffering from delusions or in the midst of something like a postpartum psychosis. You know, these, those are things that happen. And you know, I remember after having both of my kids, everywhere you go in every checkup, you know, they ask you about your, about your mental state and they really tell you to keep an eye on that. Now, with that said, right. Do we as a culture provide any institutional support for any of, of that? No. And I think that's a huge problem. Right, because people can, under duress, under stress, under the influence, you know, under substance abuse because of extreme stress due to poverty. Like, these are all reasons that people harm their children. That can be mitigated, that can be prevented. I'm not totally sure what the preventative measure could have been taken for someone like Susan Smith. And it's an interesting, like, open question. Was she always going to do this? Was she always going to, to go on to commit an act of violence? Or was there something about this specific set of circumstances where there could have been some kind of intervention? But it's hard. It's hard to know what that might have looked like.
- [51:41]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, I mean, insofar as she was assaulted by her stepfather and, you know, like, just. It doesn't sound like that ever was resolved in a way that, you know, would have been healing for her. I imagine that, you know, her whole life probably would have been different had that not happened or had she received the proper support. And then. And you gotta imagine that she's the child in the vulnerable position when you're talking about, you know, her, her stepdad assaulting her. So I. Not to say, oh, yeah, like, had that not happened, then this wouldn't have happened. But I imagine like her whole life would have been different had that not happened. So I think in her case it's like, certainly it doesn't mitigate her culpability, but like, I do wonder about that playing into things, especially if it seems like based on her psychological assessment that she, you know, had some sort of, like, would become extremely distressed if she was alone or whatever. And this Sort of like something is wrong about her attachment style or her, you know, clearly she's very attached to this guy that she's having this affair with.
- [52:41]
Andrea Dunlop
Right.
- [52:41]
Celisia Stanton
That she's going to go to these extreme lengths. And I imagine that her relationship with a step parent who's supposed to be, you know, a safe and guiding like, figure in your life would, would maybe impact some of that. So I kind of wonder if, you know, things could have been different.
- [52:57]
Well, friends, it's 2025. It's here.
- [53:01]
Andrea Dunlop
This year is going to be. Well, one thing it won't be is boring.
- [53:06]
Celisia Stanton
And that's about the only prediction I'm.
- [53:08]
Andrea Dunlop
Going to make right now.
- [53:09]
Celisia Stanton
But one piece of news that I am excited to share is that the wait for my new book, the Mother Next Door is almost over. It is coming at you on February 4th from St. Martin's Press.
- [53:21]
Andrea Dunlop
So soon.
- [53:22]
Celisia Stanton
I co authored this book with friend and beloved contributor of this show, Detective Mike Weber, about three of the most impactful cases of his career. Even if you are one of the OG est of OG listeners to this show, I promise you are going to learn so many new and shocking details about the three cases we cover. We just go into so much more depth on these stories and you're also going to learn a ton about Mike's story. Now I know y'all love Detective Mike because he gets his very own fan mail here at Nobody Should Believe Me. And if you've ever wondered how did Mike become the detective when it came to Munchausen by proxy cases, you are going to learn all about his origin story in this book. And I know we've got many audiobook listeners out there, so I am very excited to share with you. The audiobook is read by me, Andrea Dunlop, your humble narrator of this very show. I really loved getting to read this book and I'm so excited to share this with you. If you are able to pre order the book, doing so will really help us out. It will signal to our publisher that there is excitement about the book and it will also give us a shot at that all important bestseller list. And of course, if that's simply not in the budget right now, we get it. Books are not cheap. Library sales are also extremely important for books. So putting in a request at your local library is a another way that you can help. So you can pre order the book right now in all formats at the.
- [54:43]
Andrea Dunlop
Link in our show notes.
- [54:44]
Celisia Stanton
And if you are in Seattle or Fort Worth, Mike and I are doing live events the week of launch which you can Also find more information about at the link in our show notes. These events will be free to attend, but please do RSVP so that we can plan accordingly. See you out there.
- [55:00]
Andrea Dunlop
The big question, I think in this, in this case was what is she going to, to be given the death penalty? So this is in July 26th of 1995, Susan is found guilty. And then they go on to, you know, so there's, there's two phases of a trial like this. There's the guilt innocence phase, and then that same jury then weighs in on the sentencing. And so then she had the sentencing part of the trial. So she's convicted of murdering both of the boys. And I think the prosecution was hoping to get like, a lesser, like, manslaughter charge, which feels totally inappropriate in this case to me. But she was convicted of murder, and under the South Carolina law at the time, she would be eligible for, for parole every two years after serving 30 years in prison. How do we feel about this sentence? And I, I, I always have, like, I have quite complicated feelings about prison as a whole. So I think it can be very hard for me to decide how, how I feel about someone's prison sentence. But. Yeah, like, how, how do you think, like, what do you think about, about this?
- [56:10]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, I mean, I don't, I'm not really an expert in like, sentencing and like, what the guidelines would have been and like, what the alternatives were. I think that oftentimes somebody might get 30 years and then they become eligible for parole, but they still end up serving life or far longer when then that sort of minimum number of years because they're not granted parole over and over and over again, especially in cases that are particularly heinous or somebody isn't showing remorse or when you haven't had, you know, you haven't actually shown that you are ready to reenter society. I don't necessarily have a problem with the idea that someone is eligible for parole, even in heinous crimes, mostly because I, you know, I think that there are instances where maybe somebody could be rehabilitated. You know, we, there are instances, there are realities where that's true. There are also times where people are wrongfully convicted. Like I, that the Alice Sebold Anthony Broadwater case I was talking about earlier. You know, Anthony was innocent. He was up for parole many times and was denied parole over and over and over again. But had he gotten out on parole, that would have been, you know, one of his only ways to sort of like, free himself. Eventually when he did get out, it wasn't because he was exonerated. It was because they were like, okay, you've. You've served the time that you need to serve, and now you got out. He wasn't exonerated until years after he had spent, you know, plenty of time on the outside labeled as a sex vendor. So all that to say that, like, I always tend to think when it comes to sentencing, it's like, what's the worst possible scenario? This, which is, you know, an innocent person is in there. You want them to have whatever options possible. I feel similarly about the death penalty, where it's like, even if we could have agree that some certain people might be deserving of the death penalty or might not be able to be rehabilitated, there's always going to be people who we are going to execute who were innocent. And so I'd rather just not have the death penalty purely because those innocent people shouldn't be killed. So I kind of view that in a similar way. And I would hope that if she's up for parole and she's not actually able to reenter society, that she's not going to be granted the option to reenter society. But, you know, I think that it's fair for people to have an opportunity to prove that they've changed.
- [58:23]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, I agree with you. And also because I think there's such a variety of reasons that people might end up committing even a heinous crime, right. Even a murder, because, you know, it's very dependent on the circumstances. And so I think you do have to look at sort of the individual offender and how dangerous they might be. So in 2024, so just last year, she came up for her first parole hearing. And, you know, basically she, you know, her argument was that she's done her time, that she is deeply remorseful for what she did, and that she made a huge mistake and that she, you know, never intended to harm her children and that she loved her children more than anything. You know, I have to say, like, when I think about what sort of accountability could look like in a case like this, right, of someone harming, you know, grievously harming or killing their children, the thing that rankles me the most is when people say how much they love their children and how much they never meant to hurt their children. And this really took me back watching her in this interview to when I interviewed Hope Ybarra, which was the perpetrator whose case we covered in the first season of the show, she did 10 years in prison. Fortunately, because of the interventions of the family members, the hospital, law enforcement, et cetera. Her child survived and is doing great, thriving. But she certainly put her child's life at risk and certainly could have killed her. And she, you know, in this interview with me, was tearful and crying and saying how much she loved her children, saying how much she never meant to hurt them, and et cetera. And I really think it really. There's something about that emphasis on how much they love their children, which. Susan Smith kind of takes a similar attack, that really rubs me the wrong way, because that leads me to believe that they don't get it, that they're not being accountable. Right. Because that's not love. That is completely the opposite. You know, we talk a lot about, yeah, like, what accountability would look like.
- [60:42]
Celisia Stanton
Right.
- [60:42]
Andrea Dunlop
Be like, I wasn't thinking of my children when I was doing this. I was acting selfishly, and it was wrong, and I didn't. I wasn't empathizing with my children. I wasn't feeling what I should have been feeling towards them. Not sort of putting it under all these layers of, like, trying to appeal to people's idea of what a mother should be like. That part of her was obviously not active. And so just sort of hear about how her talk about how much she loved her children. I'm like, no, but you did not.
- [61:12]
Celisia Stanton
You.
- [61:12]
Andrea Dunlop
You committed this horrible, you know, murder, and then you lied about it. You put other people at the community at risk. You, you know, put the, you know, law enforcement in a situation where they were dedicating all of these resources that are then taking away from other people who need those resources. And so that is like a really a crime against the community as well. And she just clearly didn't like, have a grasp on any of those things. And she sort of. It felt very much like she was saying what she thought she should say, just like sort of a script, you know?
- [61:48]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah. I think it's interesting that she is still not just kind of coming clean about her actual motive. Right. Because, like, after the crime, after she commits the crime and after she confesses to it, she says, you know, this initial thing about the murder suicide. We all know that's probably not true. I mean, it seems to be pretty clear what her motive was, which is to sort of get rid of her old life so that she could enter into this relationship with this man that she was having an affair with. I don't know why she's not admitting to that now, 30 years later. You know, at this point, you would think that it would just kind of serve her to say that's what I was trying to do. I see now through therapy and whatever else, that that was wrong. And I've developed XYZ coping mechanisms to prevent myself from harming people in the future. That, to me, would be what accountability looks like. I totally agree what you're. With what you're saying. It seems like it's more of a performance. And then also, not to mention just like kind of what's been going on since she's been in prison. Sort of interesting. She's had all of these, like, inappropriate relationships with the different prison guards. You said it was. And I think, think that, that, you know, it's sad because it seems like it's sort of mirroring some of the other, you know, things in her life where she is perhaps she is sort of dependent on, you know, really needing a relationships, particularly maybe a romantic one, and that these sort of, like, inappropriate relationships are kind of appealing to her in some way, like, whether it be an affair or, you know, what happened when she was initially assaulted, you know, wrongly by her stepdad. And now, you know, and let's be clear, as a, like, as an incarcerated person, the, the, the guards who were engaging in this, you know, sexual relationship with her are the aggressors here because she's the vulnerable person in that, insofar as she's a prisoner. That's not to say that she's not involved, that she doesn't take any. She shouldn't have any accountability for, like, inappropriate relationships. But it's like, kind of disturbing that these guards were even. That there were multiple guards that were like, entering into these relationships with her. And that's something that does happen in prison. And so anyways, all of that to say that, like, I feel like all of those behaviors, behaviors since she's been in prison sort of indicate that maybe, you know, the necessary growth hasn't happened. And, you know, that's just kind of furthered by those statements that she's making.
- [63:58]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. And I, I really think about, you know, and David Smith, her, you know, former husband, who's the father of those boys, did, Did a couple interviews around this. And he's generally. It's my understanding that he's generally been pretty reticent to talk to media. This is obviously not a sort of fame that he wanted. And so he did give some interviews around this time. And he did testify at her parole hearing and against her being paroled. And I just think about, like, you know, with the accountability piece. Right. Cause there's obviously nothing that she can do or say that will make this go away. The harm has been caused, the pain is real. That will last for out, you know, throughout all of the lives of the people who cared about these boys. And it's just a huge tragedy. But I do think, and I wonder, like, if it's frustrating for me to hear her talk about how much she loved her kids. I can't imagine what that's like for their father to hear her say that because it's so. It's so false and like, that. I do think for, you know, for people who are harmed by. Who are victimized by abusers. Right. And who are. And I think he's a, you know, David is a victim of Susan. Like, just to even have them acknowledge the truth, like, can provide a great deal of relief to be able to kind of move forward, you know, not that you're gonna necessarily forgive them, although I think that's kind of up to the person, you know, the person doing it. But, like, just to have her never take accountability and never just, like, acknowledge, like, yeah, I did a selfish thing for selfish reasons. There's no, no excuse. Like, and I was not acting out of love. I was. This was, you know, my boys deserved a mother that loved them and it wasn't me. You know, like, just to really just say the thing. And I don't expect that he's probably ever going to get that. And so In November of 2024, she was unanimously denied parole and. And her ex husband, David Smith, testified And there were 14 other witnesses that came forward. Yeah, And I think this is, you know, I think the parole thing, I think it's really good that that exists because again, you can't assume that the system gets it right. Right. And there are people that are either serving time for crimes they didn't commit or serving too much time for crimes that, you know, they did commit. And I think there's a lot of reasons that that balance is in. Is in play and it should be there. But it's also kind of heartbreaking to think about the family having to now relive this every two years for the rest of her life.
- [66:35]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, that's interesting. I didn't think about the. I was thinking about the 30 years and then eligible for parole. Not so much the frequency that she gets to kind of plead her case every two years. That's super frequent. And so, yeah, that is definitely one of those things where, yeah, you have to re. Sort of live that experience and trauma. That's one of the things I've been kind of thinking, thinking about we did in season two, the two part episode on the Manson murders. And you know, the women who were, who had committed this murder alongside Manson and were imprisoned, you know, like, have had these very widely talked about parole hearings over the years. And it's just been kind of interesting to hear what the family has had to say about that, about how it's just so, you know, they have to like kind of go back into, into the spotlight every single time, especially in that case because it's been covered so much. And then they're sort of like fighting to essentially, you know, keep these folks behind bars because they feel like that's, you know, justice for their family member. And yeah, that's just definitely one of the, like the far reaching impacts of her initial, Susan's initial actions. You know, we think about the victims like she killed her kids and that's so often for even just those two boys, right. Who were killed. But then the ripple effects go on and on and on. And the parole hearings is just one example of that.
- [68:00]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, yeah. And again, it's like I don't really have a solution, like what sort of punishment does someone deserve? Right? Like, what do they deserve to sort of pay for their crime? Is that even possible in a case like this? Is there any sort of like restitution that can be made in a case like this? And then how do you keep society safe from someone who is capable of this kind of thing? And I was very struck, like, I do think in her defense, not me making her defense. Her defense's strategy during her trial was to soften her, right? Was to lean into this image of, of what we think a mother is. And you know, she's very young at the time, she's in her early 20s. And they really appealed to the jury for sympathy. And I was really struck by this statement about Susan Smith that, you know, her, her, that her defense team made in the closing arguments. Susan Smith has never shown anything but, quote, unconditional love for her children. And her attorney, Clark claimed it was not murder as there was no malice in Susan Smith's actions. And added, this is not a case about evil, but a case about sadness and despair.
- [69:24]
Celisia Stanton
Odd, very odd thing to say.
- [69:28]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. And I just thought that is such an extraordinary framing to put on the, this case.
- [69:38]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, definitely. Yeah. I don't, I don't that, that doesn't fit with any framework with which I view the world. So I don't even know where to start with that. I mean, you know, murder is. Murder is murder. You Know, and I think that, like, there are differences, of course, in terms of the factors and. And why it happened and whether or not it could have been prevented and whether or not the person who, like, pulled the trigger or in this case drove the car off the. The dock has 100. Or perhaps there are other people who also have responsibility. But, like, if you kill somebody, you killed somebody, it doesn't really matter what your intent was. But I would say that, you know, like, her intent was to get rid of her children, so her intent was malice. I don't. I don't understand.
- [70:23]
Andrea Dunlop
Right.
- [70:23]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah.
- [70:23]
Andrea Dunlop
I mean, I. That. That seems bananas that you would say there was no malice in her actions. And I think what they were leaning into was, like, that we could sort of see it as, oh, she was having a break with reality of some kind. But, of course, there's no evidence of that. That. Yeah. And so, you know, there's another statement from her attorney that struck me where, you know. Yeah. He said her situation was about the dangers of untreated mental health and noted that because she had no criminal history before her conviction, that made her a low risk to the public. And I was like, well, you know, it's not like this was her first offense and she, you know, robbed a liquor store. It's, you know, she went from zero to a million. So I don't. I don't know that that's really, like, previous criminal history just doesn't really matter in this case, I don't think. And there was a quote from the prosecutor in the AP coverage of this case that I think really kind of hit the nail on the head when they were arguing for the death penalty. And again, I don't support the death penalty, so I don't sort of care that she didn't get it. But I think this was a really interesting. This was a really interesting take and said, I just felt strongly that had a black man with the. With the tabloid Boggin Hatt committed the crime, people would expect the death penalty. If David Smith had committed the crime, people would have expected the death penalty. And I. I think that's right.
- [71:41]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah. Yeah. No, I definitely agree with that. I think that. And, you know, similar to your point, I. I don't necessarily think that she should have gotten the death penalty anyway or that any of these people, you know, should. They have committed the crime, should have gotten the death penalty. But, like, I do think it is worth acknowledging the differences in how people are treated. Um, yeah, so it kind of. It makes me think about the case of Joanne Little, which I covered in season one of. Of my show, True or Crime. You know, and this was also a case in South Carolina, and this was a. A young woman who was being held at a local jail, and she was attacked by the prison guard that was on duty, and she ended up, in defending herself, killing him. Um, he was trying to assault her. And so then she was, like, on the run, essentially, because she was like, oh, my gosh, here I am, a black woman woman. I've just killed this guard. Like, I'm toast. Essentially, she takes off, and it kind of is like hiding in the community. And then she ends up kind of like igniting this whole sort of movement because, you know, folks who had been working on civil rights, women's rights activists, prison rights activists, all kind of rally behind her, but they were really trying to. To get her on the death penalty for killing this guard. And, you know, it just shocking to think that, you know, there are some people we sort of think, you know, deserve death, and then other people who think are, you know, worthy of more leniency. And, you know, I think empathy and also a belief that we should try to rehabilitate people is important, but it's like, be great if that could be extended to, you know, all types of people.
- [73:18]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah, absolutely. One thing I was thinking about in sort of response to that quote from Pope is like, if this had been a black male carjacker, and he. Some harm had come to the children or he had killed the children, um, which in many ways, to me, that is a less heinous crime than killing your own children. I mean, it heinous either way. But it's sort of. I think it's sort of less disturbing, I think. I think a mother killing their own children is probably the most disturbing thing that. That people can sort of come up with. But nonetheless, if. If it had been a black male offender that had committed this crime, we would not be having a conversation about his mental health.
- [74:02]
Celisia Stanton
No, definitely not. There would be no discussion of mental health. But I do think it's interesting how the mental health conversation even happens both ways, because it's like sometimes, you know, in this case, we're talking about it as her defense of, like, maybe she has less culpability. And then in some cases, it's sort of weaponized against women of, like, you know, you're crazy, and. And therefore, that's like, proof that you did commit a crime or something like that. Like, I think of the Darlie Rudier case that I was talking about earlier, one of the big Things that the prosecution was kind of pushing against her was this idea that she maybe she was suffering postpartum depression and, you know, that's why she had killed her kids. And it was sort of like, instead of that being sort of like a point of empathy or understanding, it's like, oh, well, you know, this actually proves that she's like an evil, terrible person. So it is interesting.
- [74:46]
Andrea Dunlop
Yeah. No, I mean, it definitely cuts both ways with women in particular. And it is something where, like, yeah, if someone is having genuine psychotic episode or genuinely suffering from delusional disorder, it is complicated. Well, thank you so much, Celicia, for doing this with me. I think this was such a fascinating, thoughtful discussion, and I really urge everyone to check out your show, True or Crime, for more of these kind of insightful takes on cases. And now you have me wanting to go back and listen to your back catalog as well. So I really thank you so much for. Thank you so much for. For doing this with me.
- [75:25]
Celisia Stanton
Yeah, this is great. It was interesting to sort of dive into this case and hear how we kind of can intersect with our kind of different perspectives in the genre. And I really appreciate it.
- [75:37]
Andrea Dunlop
Nobody should believe me. Case Files is produced and hosted by me, Andrea Dunlop. Our editor is Greta Stromquist, and our senior producer is Mariah Gossett. Administrative support from Nola Carmouche.
- [76:04]
Celisia Stanton
Well, friends, it's 2025. It's here.
- [76:08]
Andrea Dunlop
This year is going to be. Well, one thing it won't be is boring.
- [76:13]
Celisia Stanton
And that's about the only prediction I'm going to make right now. But one piece of news that I am excited to share is that the wait for my new book, the Mother Next Door, is almost over. It is coming at you on February 4th from St. Martin's Press.
- [76:28]
Andrea Dunlop
So soon.
- [76:29]
Celisia Stanton
I co authored this book with friend and beloved contributor of this show, Detective Mike Weber, about three of the most impactful cases of his career. Even if you are one of the OG Est of OG Listeners to this show, I promise you are going to learn so many new and shocking details about the three cases we cover. We just go into so much more depth on these stories. And you're also going to learn a ton about Mike's story. Now, I know y'all love Detective Mike because he gets his very own fan mail here at Nobody Should Believe Me. And if you've ever wondered, how did Mike become the detective when it came to Munchausen by proxy cases, you are going to learn all about his origin story in this book. And I know we've got many audiobook listeners out there, so I am very excited to share share with you. The audiobook is read by me, Andrea Dunlop, your humble narrator of this very show. I really loved getting to read this book and I'm so excited to share this with you. If you are able to pre order the book, doing so will really help us out. It will signal to our publisher that there is excitement about the book and it will also give us a shot at that all important bestseller list. And of course, if that's simply not in the budget right now, we get it. Books are not cheap. Library sales are also extremely important for books, so putting in a request at your local library is another way that you can help. So you can pre order the book right now in all formats at the.
- [77:50]
Andrea Dunlop
Link in our Show Notes.
- [77:51]
Celisia Stanton
And if you are in Seattle or Fort Worth, Mike and I are doing live events the week of launch, which you can also find more information about at the link in our Show Notes. These events will be free to attend, but please do RSVP so that we can plan accordingly. See you out there.