20/20 Recap for Never Made it Home
20/20 Recap for Never Made it Home
-This week’s 20/20, Never Made it Home, features Kristin Smart, a college student who went missing in 1996 and is suspected to have been killed by Paul Flores. He has since been charged with her murder despite the fact that her body was never found.
-On Memorial Day weekend in 1996, Kristin has attended a party off campus. She was a student at Cal Poly and looking to enjoy her night despite the fact that her friends decided to go home early in the evening.
-Trevor Boelter, who was at the party, says that the party was nothing crazy, just people together for someone’s birthday. He was twenty at the time and planned on going home early to study for exams. He recalls seeing Kristin at the party, but that she introduced herself as Roxy. She was in black shorts, red Pumas and a shirt at the time of the meeting. She had kissed him and pulled him into the bathroom where she began putting on makeup and obsessing over her appearance. He left when she said she had to use the bathroom.
-After he left the bathroom, he was approached by another guy, who he’d assumed was her boyfriend. It was a weird encounter, but he chose to ignore it.
-At around 2am, the party began winding down. Kristin was passed out on the lawn, so a girl named Cheryl and Paul helped take her home. He said he would make sure Kristin would get home safely, so Cheryl went home. Kristin was never seen again.
-Kristin’s friend Magrarita Campos realized she was gone and she, along with other friends, reported her missing. Since she hadn’t been gone long enough, there was not much that could be done. She was finally reported missing two days later, after it was confirmed that she wasn’t simply home for the weekend.
-The investigation began on May 27th, with everyone searching for the young college co-ed. Her things were still in her room, so they knew she didn’t disappear on her own accord.
-The media picked up on the case, while the police did their best to find her. There was little hope that she would be found on campus.
-At one point Margarita and another roommate of Kristin’s get a confusing call, making them wonder if she was trying to reach them for help.
-Kristin’s parents Denise and Stan continued with their own part of the search, doing whatever they could to try and bring their daughter home.
-Paul was questioned and denied any involvement in her disappearance. He admitted to being with her that night and was holding her to keep her warm. He’d also said that he didn’t walk her to her room, but just to the dorms.
-Police noticed that Paul had a black eye and bruises, which he said came from a basketball game. He agreed to take a polygraph test when asked.
-The current administration at the university were not around so they could not comment on the case.
-Before long, the sheriffs took over the investigation, despite the work that the campus police tried to do.
-Paul is questioned again and not cooperating much.
-The dorms are cleaned, making it harder to find any evidence of anything that could have happened to Kristin.
-Search dogs were brought on the case to help follow Kristin’s scent to see if it would help. They went right up to Paul’s side of the room, making authorities infer that something could have happened to her in that room.
-Paul finally admits to lying during one of the times he was questioned. The biggest lie was about is black eye, which he’d initially claimed came from a basketball game. He then said it happened when he was working on his car. This, along with his body language made the cops even more suspicious of his role in Kristin’s disappearance.
-People that knew Paul described him as a loner who was kind of weird. He was also a ‘terrible’ student who often got in trouble.
-Paul was also known to be a heavy drinker and ladies were told to stay away from him since he was known as ‘Chester the Molester.’
-A former classmate of Paul’s named Trisha Roberts felt that his behavior regarding Kristin’s disappearance was very odd.
-The Smarts are still trying to get answers and keep trying to get answer from the Flores family. Paul, for his part, was getting fired from jobs and had failed to get into the Navy.
-Paul’s parents Reuben and Susan were also questioned and also refused to cooperate.
-During this time Rachel Newhouse and Aundria Crawford, two twenty-year-old college students from the area also went missing. It was briefly considered that their disappearances were connected to Kristin’s, but it turned out that they were both killed by Rex Krebs. Focus once again turned to Paul.
-Police stopped at nothing to try and get him to confess. The defense lawyer for Reuben maintains that there is a chance Kristin is still out there because there is no body.
-In 2005, Trevor was questioned about any other theories about what could have happened, but came up with nothing.
-In an odd twist of fate, Scott Peterson, who was convicted of murdering his pregnant wife Laci, was a student at the school at the time of Kristin’s disappearance. However, he had an alibi and was cleared.
-Twenty years after her disappearance, there was a possibility that they were going to be able to find Kristin’s body. Sadly, this did not pan out.
-After two decades, search warrants are finally brought in to search Paul’s house in connection with the disappearance. There was also evidence that he had been drugging and raping women that he would bring home. However, he was never charged in any case.
-It wasn’t until Chris Lambert began the Your Own Backyard podcast that more attention was finally brought to the case. He was able to get people who knew Kristin and Paul to talk, including women who claimed to have been drugged by him.
-A woman named Jennifer Hudson claims that Paul confessed to killing Kristin to her, scaring her enough to not show up to the ramp where he hung out. She only came forward recently out of fear of what could have happened to her if she talked. She regrets not saying something sooner.
-Reuben’s roommate talks to the podcast and how Reuben would never let anyone go to a certain part of the house, including people who needed to do plumbing work. This made others infer that this is where Kristin’s body was hidden.
-A search began with a special machine, followed by digging. They were able to find some evidence, but no body or bones. They did get the stains they found analyzed, which turned out to be human blood. There were red, black and grey fibers, which were the colors Kristin wore the night she disappeared.
-Paul and Reuben were both arrested for the crime.
-I have no clue why we had a Law and Order clip with the Chief from Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego playing or how it connects to the case, but okay. My guess is to show it doesn’t work this way in real life?
-Seeing how many Sunday phone calls were missed since all this happened is truly heartbreaking.
-The fact that Kristin supposedly got incapacitated so quickly and other women claimed that they ended up being raped by Paul after accepting drinks from him makes this while case even more disturbing.
-After 26 years, hours of testimony and a long trial, Paul is found guilty of murder. Reuben was found not guilty.
-Kristin’s body has yet to be found. Cal Poly has apologized to the Smart family for how they handled the case.
-Paul is sentenced to 25 years to life but is appealing his sentencing.
