3rd man guilty in murder-for-hire slaying of Samantha Dean
A man who authorities say was hired by a former Austin police officer to kill a woman pregnant with his child in 2015 was found guilty of capital murder last week.
Freddie Lee Smith was arrested in 2019 and charged with one count of capital murder, four years after the slaying of Samantha Dean and her unborn child. He was booked into the Bastrop County Jail and a grand jury later indicted him for capital murder.
In a trial delayed for two years by the coronavirus pandemic, a jury after six hours of deliberations convicted Smith, according to the Texas Attorney General's office, which assisted Bastrop County prosecutors in the case.
Former Austin Police Department officer VonTrey Clark, who prosecutors have previously said had an on-and-off relationship with Dean for several years, hired Smith and another man Kevin Leo Watson to kill Dean for $5,000.
When she was found dead on Feb. 4, 2015, Dean, who was a Kyle Police Department crime victims counselor, was almost seven months pregnant with her and Clark’s child. She had refused Clark's demands to end her pregnancy, and had already named the baby Madeline, according to court documents. Clark has a family with his common-law wife.
More:Third man accused of killing pregnant Samantha Dean to face trial in 2022
According to authorities, Clark, Watson and Smith had created and implemented an elaborate murder-for-hire scheme to kill Dean. But their burner phone records, geolocation data, and cellular forensic exams revealed their criminal plan to investigators looking into the case. Both Watson and Smith lived in Harris County and the Houston area.
The evidence at the trial showed that Clark lured Dean to Bastrop under false pretenses, where Smith then shot her in the head at a vacant shopping center. After Smith shot Dean twice, Clark fired an additional shot into her body. Watson also participated in the planning of the crime and gave Smith a ride to and from the murder scene.
In July 2015, Clark fled to Indonesia when search warrants and court orders detailing evidence against him were unsealed. The Indonesian government arrested Clark in Bali and extradited him to Texas at the request of the FBI and Texas Rangers. He was officially fired from the Austin Police Department in 2016.
Clark pleaded guilty to capital murder in December 2019 and was sentenced to life without parole. Watson, who initially pleaded not guilty in 2016, pleaded guilty to murder in 2019 and is scheduled to be sentenced this month.
This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Man found guilty in murder-for-hire death of Samantha Dean
