Disappearance of Kristin Smart

Kristin Denise Smart (legally presumed dead May 25, 2002) is an American woman who disappeared on May 25, 1996, while attending California Polytechnic State University. Three fellow students escorted Smart back to her hall of residence after a party. Her disappearance is an actively investigated missing person case. On September 6, 2016, the San Luis Obispo Sheriff Department reported it had received information about the possible location of Smart's remains, resulting in a hillside excavation on the Cal Poly campus. After three days of digging, bones were recovered from at least one excavation site. However, it was initially unclear if the findings were animal or human, and forensic analysis may take months to determine this. Kristin Smart is not related to Elizabeth Smart, a Salt Lake City, Utah teen who was abducted in June 2002 and found alive in March 2003. Disappearance of kristin smart: Kristin Smart was enrolled at California Polytechnic State University, or Cal Poly, in San Luis Obispo, California. On the night she disappeared, Smart attended a birthday party for a fellow student, which fell on Memorial Day weekend. At approximately 2:00 a.m. on May 25, 1996, she was found passed out on a neighbor's lawn by two fellow students, Cheryl Anderson and Tim Davis, who both had just left the party. They helped Smart to her feet and decided to walk her back to her nearby dormitory. Another student from the party, Paul Flores, joined their group and offered to help the two return Smart to her dorm room safely. Davis departed the group first since he lived off campus and had driven to the party. Anderson was the second to depart the group after she told Flores that he could walk Smart back to her dorm, since he lived closer. Flores stated to police that he walked Smart as far as his dormitory, Santa Lucia Hall, and then allowed her to walk back to her Muir Hall dorm by herself. This was the last known sighting of her. She did not have any money or credit cards at the time she went missing. Official investigation into Kristin's disappearance: The University Police Department originally suspected that Smart had gone on an unannounced vacation, as was common among students over the holidays, and as a result were slow in reporting her as a missing person to local law enforcement. During the Laci Peterson murder investigation, there were unfounded rumors in the media that Laci's husband Scott Peterson had something to do with Smart's disappearance due to their simultaneous attendance at the Cal Poly campus. There was a brief initial inquiry into whether Peterson was tied to the disappearance, with Peterson denying any involvement, and he was eventually ruled out as a suspect by police. Smart's disappearance remains an unsolved case, with no compelling evidence having been discovered to indicate what happened to her, and no body ever having been discovered. Between 1996 and 2007, many searches were conducted, some using police dogs trained to detect the scent of human remains, including searches of properties owned by the Flores family. No useful leads were found. On September 6, 2016, officials from the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff's Office announced they were investigating a new lead in the case. Cadaver dogs from the FBI were brought in and investigators were preparing to spend approximately four days excavating an area on the Cal Poly campus. After three days, items were found at all three dig sites located on the same hillside near Smart's dorm. A spokesman for the sheriff's office said, "The items are being analyzed to see whether they are connected to the case, which could take days, weeks or months". The items uncovered are still being investigated as of 2017. Legacy of the Kristin smart disappearance: Smart's disappearance and slow response by the campus police resulted in the Kristin Smart Campus Security Act being written and sponsored by State Senator Mike Thompson, passed 61–0 by the California State Legislature, and signed into effect by then-Governor Pete Wilson on August 19, 1998. The law took effect on January 1, 1999, and requires all public colleges and publicly funded educational institutions to have their security services make agreements with local police departments about reporting cases involving or possibly involving violence against students, including missing students. Smart was declared legally dead on May 25, 2002, the sixth anniversary of her disappearance. Her parents, Denise and Stan Smart, took a civil case of wrongful death against Flores, one of the three students who walked Smart to her dorm, in 2005. Flores has denied any involvement in the disappearance. The Flores family had also filed a lawsuit against the Smart family for emotional distress. The San Luis Obispo County Sheriff's Office still reviews the case regularly, having spent thousands of hours and dollars in the last five years (2011–2016). The FBI have her on file as a high priority missing person investigation, with a reward of $75,000 for information leading to finding her or resolving her case. Terry Black, a Delta-area man, offered a $100,000 reward for Smart's body. Controversy of the case: In June 2014, retired police detective sergeant Paul Dostie was asked by a local newspaper* to bring his famous grave detection dog (BUSTER) to Arroyo Grande, California to walk the perimeter of the fence surrounding the home owned by the parents of the last person seen with Kristin Smart in the early morning hours of May 25, 1996. BUSTER, according to Detective Dostie has nearly 250 discovered bodies to his credit, and had helped to locate the remains of Marines on the island atoll of Tarawa who were killed during the Battle of Tarawa November 1943. Seventy-two years after being lost, BUSTER alerted on top of a trench that held the bodies of several Marines, including a missing Medal of Honor winner, Alexander Bonnyman. Once BUSTER arrived in Arroyo Grande, he gave a very strong alerts near the rear left corner of the backyard fence. This information was immediately passed along to the sheriff through the Smart family attorney. The sheriff decided not to either contact Detective Dostie or make any effort to obtain a search warrant. Soil samples were also taken and one came back as a weak-positive for human remains. According to Dr. Vass, it's possible the retaining wall holding up the fence in the rear left corner may be hindering the normal migration of contaminates through the water table in the soil. In January 2017, Dr. Arpad Vass flew out from Tennessee to scan the area with his new grave-detection invention which in July 2018, he received an approval for his applied patent. Dr. Vass received fingernail clippings from Kristin's parents and from approximately two blocks away (in the parking lot of Mason Bar and Kitchen at 307 E. Branch St., Arroyo Grande, CA), got a hit from his machine pointing towards Kristin's remains. Amazingly, his machine was pointing towards the area where BUSTER had alerted three years prior. This indicated a very high likelihood the body of Kristin Smart is or was in this location. Dr. Vass took readings from three different positions to triangulate and achieve an more precise location. All of the bearings from his machine intersected near the rear left corner of the home where BUSTER had alerted multiple times. From there Dr. Vass was taken to Cal Poly to sweep the area where the sheriff had a major dig six months prior. As he swept the area his machine detected nothing, but then suddenly; his machine got a hit on a bearing to Santa Lucia Hall Dormitory and amazingly on a line directly towards the former dorm room where sheriff cadaver dogs alerted a month or more after Kristin disappeared. Dr. Vass explained his machine could detect a single drop of blood, even it if was 22 years later. Dr. Vass was then taken to the parking lot in front of the sheriff's office and his machine detected once again to an out-building believed to be used as an evidence storage locker. Even though Dr. Vass has a list of references from law enforcement, the hits by his machine were discounted by the sheriff and DA's office. Not once has the sheriff ever spoken to Dr. Vass or Detective Paul Dostie. Based on alerts from the grave-detection dog BUSTER and from the hits from Dr. Vass's machine, there is a strong belief the body of Kristin Smart or some lingering remains of her body if it was moved, can be found in the rear left corner of the Arroyo Grande home owned by the parents of the last person seen with Kristin Smart. The Smart family sued the person of interest for wrongful death, but he invoked the 5th Amendment 27 times when deposed* and that's they way it's been since Kristin disappeared in 1996.