The Murder of William Lester Smith

Murder, She Told

Kristen Seavey

True Crime, Society & Culture, Documentary

4.9 • 1.4K Ratings

🗓️ 16 July 2024

⏱️ 55 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

1983 - Auburn, Maine. While hiking in Mount Apatite Park in June of 1983, a woman stumbled on the body of 36-year-old William Lester Smith partially hidden under scavenged sheet metal and forest debris. William was part of a mineral club at home in Massachusetts, and had come to the park to search its quarries for treasure. Two days prior, William had been seen in the company of 16-year-old Jeff Smith. The pair were not related. It didn’t take police long to arrest their suspect. But in the eleventh hour as the trial inched closer, a narrative from the defense emerged that changed everything. Episode sources and photos: coming soon! Support the show: https://www.murdershetold.com/support Instagram: @murdershetoldpodcast TikTok: @murdershetold Facebook: /mstpodcast Website: murdershetold.com ----- Sponsors: OneSkin: Get 15% off your order at at https://www.oneskin.co with the code SHETOLD Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:24.3	Sign up for a one dollar a month trial at shopify.com slash listen. I'm Kristen Seavy. This is Murder She Told. This is Murder She Told.
0:48.4	This episode discusses violence in the LGBTQ community and the defense of gay panic.
0:55.0	Please listen with care.
0:57.0	Billy Smith was five years old when the Blizzard of 52 hit Maine.
1:08.0	Otherwise known as the February 1952 Norreaster, the storm pummeled the lower half of the state and most of New England.
1:16.5	He watched as the wall of white crept up the window panes of their house.
1:21.1	Where he was, in rural Central Maine, houses were snowed in and roads were blocked for days.
1:27.0	Billy was 12 miles from Bangor, the nearest city.
1:31.0	Though he was safe with his family and warmed by the wood stove he could sense tension in the air
1:36.4	his big sister 8 year old Gloria was sick and she needed to go to the doctor but the snow made the
1:42.2	roads impassable. His parents called for help but even the
1:46.0	ambulance got stuck in a snowdrift. Plow operators who had been working nearly non-stop since the storm, worked for eight hours straight to reach
1:55.3	his home.
1:56.3	He saw his parents carry his big sister, who was quite sick, out the front door into a waiting
2:02.4	warmed vehicle. She was driven to the hospital where she was
2:05.8	diagnosed with pneumonia and an ear infection. She was sick for a long time. And that June,
	...

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