As far as Baltimore prosecutors are concerned, this is one down, one more to go. Valeria Smith pleaded guilty on Thursday in the death of her stepmother Jacquelyn Smith. This leaves her father Keith Smith as the remaining defendant.
Smith pleaded guilty to being an accessory after the fact: giving false statements to police and the media and assisted in the coverup by tossing Jacquelyn Smith’s pocketbook, disposing of the murder weapon and assisting in Keith Smith’s attempted flee to Mexico @WMAR2News
— Brian Kuebler (@BrianKuebler_) September 26, 2019
Her trial was set to begin Thursday, but she pleaded guilty to accessory to the murder.
A longtime friend tells #wjz Jacquelyn Smith had a heart of the world and this in an #injustice . Stepdaughter Valeria Smith is now scheduled to appear before a judge for her alleged involvement in the fatal stabbing from Dec 1, 2018 https://t.co/oatHhsxUEi pic.twitter.com/YQw1ORbgSX
— Rachael Cardin (@RachaelCardin) September 26, 2019
Jacquelyn Smith was murdered last December. At the time, authorities believed that she was killed after she gave money to a panhandler. The official story changed. Authorities arrested the victim’s husband and stepdaughter near the U.S.-Mexico border in Combes, Texas last March. Keith Smith told a lie, they said.
“Something needs to be done, because now you don’t know whether or not you’re going to give and this person’s going to take your life or they’re going to say thank you,” Keith Smith said in December, according to The Baltimore Sun. Back then, people saw him as a grieving husband. “There are some desperate people. They don’t need help; they’re trying to hurt you.”
[Screengrab via WJZ]
