(Trends Wide) — A vibrant presence. Always smiling, always naughty. A dreamer with plans to one day become a nurse.
This is how Sandy Smith remembers her 19-year-old son, Stephen, whose voice she hasn’t heard in more than seven years.
Her body was found in the middle of a rural Hampton County, South Carolina road on July 8, 2015, with the death initially ruled a hit-and-run.
In the summer of 2021, the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) announced that it had opened an investigation into Smith’s death based on information obtained while investigating the June 7 murders. 2021 of Margaret Murdaugh and her son Paul Murdaugh.
Earlier this month, disgraced and disbarred attorney Alex Murdaugh was convicted and sentenced to life in prison for the murder of his wife and son.
Authorities have not announced a connection between the Murdaugh family and Smith’s death. Investigators also have not revealed what was found in the investigation of the Murdaugh murders that led to a new look at Smith’s case.
On Tuesday, SLED reported that it is now investigating Smith’s death as a homicide, confirming that there was no indication that he died in a hit-and-run.
“We believe it was a murder,” SLED boss Mark Keel told the newspaper. The State this Tuesday.
All this time, Smith’s mother has fought for one thing: justice.
“It was not a hit and run. That’s what I’ve been saying all along,” Sandy Smith told Trends Wide’s Anderson Cooper on Wednesday night. “I felt like my son was killed.”
Here’s what we know about who Stephen Smith was.
“He knew he was loved”
Sandy and Stephen Smith were always close and she was always there for him, Sandy says. (Family picture)
Stephen’s mother describes him as a cheerful young man who liked to make others smile.
“You could have a bad day and all I had to do was walk in the room and say something, and it was like your mood was gone because you couldn’t stop (from laughing),” Sandy Smith previously told Randi Kaye. from Trends Wide.
“He was my life,” he said Wednesday. “He was my baby.”
Stephen had a playful side and loved to tease his mother.
“The way he used to sneak up behind me, then he’d just tickle my neck and then we’d chase each other so I could kiss him,” she told Trends Wide affiliate WCIV.
Stephen was mischievous since he was young. But the two were always close and she was always there for him, Sandy Smith said.
“A lot of people asked, ‘Well, what was it like when you came out?’ And I’m like, ‘Well, he never had to come out.’ He never had to say, ‘Hey, Mom, I’m gay.’ He knew he was loved. And his choices in life were his choices and he didn’t have to answer to me. or anyone else about who he was.”
Both Sandy Smith and the family’s lawyers have raised the possibility that Stephen was targeted for being gay.
“I think they killed him for being gay. Remember, we’re in the South Carolina Lowcountry,” Smith family attorney Eric Bland told Trends Wide Wednesday. “It wasn’t easy being gay in Bamberg, South Carolina, not easy at all.”
“I was proud to be gay. However, he had to be cautious. And people who have to be cautious have to be reserved,” Bland said.
The case file from the South Carolina Highway Patrol’s initial investigation into Smith’s death – released by the patrol to Trends Wide – shows that Murdaugh’s name was mentioned dozens of times by witnesses and investigators, including the name of the Alex Murdaugh’s surviving son, Buster.
Neither Buster Murdaugh nor anyone else has been charged in the case.
Buster Murdaugh, a former classmate of Smith’s, issued a statement Monday denying any involvement in Smith’s death and asking the media to “immediately stop publishing these defamatory comments and rumors about me.”
“I was so excited to be a nurse”
Sandy Smith maintains that her son’s death was not caused by an accident. (Trends Wide)
Stephen Smith enrolled as a student at Orangeburg-Calhoun Technical College in the summer of 2015, a spokesperson for the university confirmed to Trends Wide.
“She was in nursing school and she was passionate about it,” Stephen’s cousin Connie Whitehead told Inside Edition Digital. “That’s what he wanted to be.”
“I was so excited to be a nurse,” his cousin commented.
Along with his passion for learning, Stephen was close to his family.
“He loved reading, he loved school, he loved his mother,” Whitehead said. “She was inseparable from his twin sister. He just had fun and was very playful.”
His twin, Stephanie Smith, told Trends Wide affiliate WCIV that talking about her brother was difficult.
“I tend not to express my feelings about Stephen because I know he’s going to make me mad,” Stephanie said through tears. “I miss him yelling at me when he made him nervous. I miss spending time with him. Just shopping is hard.”
Whitehead added that his cousin was “a sweet, sweet person.”
“He wanted to make something of himself,” he said. “He was doing really well and they wrecked everything.”
