MICHAEL and ALEX SMITH - 3 yo and 14 months (1994) - Spartanburg SC

Multiple media outlets report Susan Smith has filed a handwritten petition in Union County for post-conviction relief.

Solicitor Kevin Brackett said Saturday that Smith is
claiming her attorney failed to adequately represent her and that the
trial was unfair.

The appeal comes a month after her petition in federal court was dismissed.




Smith is serving a life sentence.
She captured the national spotlight in 1994 when she told
investigators her two young sons had been taken in a carjacking, and
she tearfully pleaded on TV for their return. She later confessed to
strapping them into their car seats and letting the car roll into a
lake.

COLUMBIA, S.C. - A judge plans to throw out Susan Smith's
request for a new trial unless the South Carolina mom convicted of leaving her
two young sons in her car to drown in 1994 can come up with better
arguments.

Smith filed a handwritten appeal earlier this year,
claiming unspecified allegations of prosecutorial misconduct and said she was
abused by her now ex-husband, David Smith.

She didn't detail the abuse and a prosecutor who tried
her said an investigation did not find any wrongdoing by her ex-husband.
Circuit Judge Lee Alford has given Smith 20 days to give
better reasons to allow her appeal to continue. Smith, who is representing
herself, has refused interview requests from The Associated Press since she was
convicted in 1995 of leaving 3-year-old Michael and 14-month-old Alex strapped
in their car seats as she rolled her car into a Union County lake in the
northwestern part of the state.

The case incensed the black community because Smith
claimed a black man carjacked her and drove off with the children.

Prosecutors said Smith killed her sons because a wealthy,
well-connected man she was having an affair with cut off the relationship.

In
her appeal, Smith mentions "battered woman's syndrome," which is normally used
when someone kills a spouse or boyfriend because they are being abused.

Prosecutor Kevin Brackett said Monday he had never heard anything
bad about David Smith.

"David Smith has a right to put this behind him,"
Brackett said. "Every time this case comes back up, it picks at a scab."

Prosecutors sought the death penalty for Smith, and
Brackett pointed out her lawyers vigorously fought to save her life. Smith's
lawyers brought in testimony she had sex with her stepfather and several other
men to argue she was depressed and intended to stay in the car and commit
suicide with her sons, but decided to jump out after releasing the emergency
brake.

The appeal also said Smith's "Amanda Rights" were
violated, apparently referring to the Fifth Amendment right to have a lawyer
present when police question a suspect. And the papers show Smith still
sometimes dots her 'i's with little circles — just like she did in her written
confession more than 15 years ago.

More than 16 years after his former wife confessed to drowning their
two young sons in a Union County lake, David Smith says what she did
almost drove him to suicide but his faith and visits to the cemetery
helped him survive.

“Susan, through the years, came close in a roundabout way of murdering me so to
speak,” Smith said. “All I can say to her is, ‘Look who's still
standing.' ”David Smith, now 40 and the father of two more children, on Tuesday talked
publicly to law enforcement officers for the first time about the
tragedy that gripped the state and nation for nine days in October 1994
after Susan Smith told authorities she was carjacked and her two young
sons taken from her.Smith,
who was estranged from her husband at the time, eventually recanted the
story and told police she had strapped her sons in her car and let it
roll into John D. Long Lake.Solicitor
Tommy Pope, now a state lawmaker, sought the death penalty. However, a
Union County jury sentenced her to life imprisonment six days after
finding her guilty of first-degree murder.David
Smith, who remarried and now lives in Spartanburg, addressed a training
conference of those involved in the investigations of child deaths in
the state, including law enforcement officers, paramedics, coroners and
others.He asked law enforcement not to let up in questioning parents of missing
children, even if the parents are offended as he was at the questions.“My
bottom line is don't take it personally if parents get snappy,” he
said. “Don't shy away. Don't feel intimidated by parents. You guys are
kind of like the voices for that child to find out what happened to them
because they obviously can't speak for themselves.
”Smith said his former wife seemed to be a good mother until
Michael, 3, and Alex, 14 months, disappeared.He
said at the time investigators were questioning him and her that he
felt resentful that they weren't out looking for his sons.After
his former wife told investigators she had been responsible for their
sons' deaths, Smith said he wanted to know why. He recalled talking to
her for the last time in a Columbia prison cell to find an answer to
that question.
“I asked her why she did it, and the only comment she told me was she didn't know why,” Smith said.

“She did tell me she was sorry. But I don't think it was as sincere or as
heartfelt as it would have been had it been me. I would have been around
her ankles begging her for forgiveness. She was just more shrugging her
shoulders I'm sorry.”Smith said he battled severe depression and thoughts of suicide for years
afterward. His faith and visits to the graves of his sons kept him
alive, he said. Having two more children also helped, he said, though he
carried a fear that something might happen to them.“I
didn't think I would be strong enough to take that chance again one day
of burying two more children,” he said. “But I think God knew I had a
lot of love left to give children.”He
said he understands why talk show host Oprah Winfrey wants to interview
his former wife. And while he has been a guest on Winfrey's show
several times, he doesn't believe it serves any good use to let the
world hear from his former wife again.“What
can she say that can change anything?” he asked. “She can't take back
what she's done. Interviewing her would just give her that satisfaction
that people still think about her, that people are still interested. It
still puts the spotlight on her. To me, she just needs to go away.”
He said he still has times when he wants to talk to her, to express the suffering she has caused.“I
want to tell her how much pain she's caused me,” he said. “How much
pain and hurt she's brought to all of my family, all of her family. But
then, the other side of me says I really don't think she cares. It would
give her the satisfaction that she does cross my mind from time to
time. As far as I'm concerned, I just want Susan Smith to not exist any more in our life.”