'We refused to give up': Kristin Smart's parents receive Key to the City of Stockton

Stan and Denise Smart, parents of slain student Kristin Smart, received the Key to the City on Thursday in front of hundreds of people at Stockton's citywide update.

Mayor Kevin Lincoln presented the plaque to the Smarts ahead of his State of the City address at the Port of Stockton. Lincoln acknowledged the Stockton residents for their decades-long fight for justice for their daughter — who disappeared after an off-campus party at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo in May 1996.

"For 27 years, the Stockton community has grieved alongside Stan and Denise Smart," Lincoln said. "The loss of a child is a wound that never truly heals, but the Smart family turned their pain into policy."

Lincoln publicly thanked the mother and father for championing the Kristin Smart Campus Safety Act — which requires community colleges and universities to have written agreements with local law enforcement outlining the operational responsibility for violent crimes that occur on campus. The act became law in 1998.

The parents also started the Kristin Smart Scholarship to benefit young women from San Joaquin or San Luis Obispo counties pursuing a degree in architecture, international studies, law enforcement, or criminal justice.

"The standing ovation from all of you really means a great deal to us," Stan Smart told the crowd. "It's taken the community ... thousands of people in this community and the San Luis Obispo community, and everybody in between, to solve this case and move forward with having the perpetrator in prison for first-degree murder."

Seven months ago, a jury found Paul Flores guilty of killing Kristin Smart in 1996 when they were students at Cal Poly. The case had been unsolved for more than two decades, however Flores had always been a suspect. Flores was sentenced to 25 years-to-life in prison in March. Kristin Smart's body has yet to be found.

Denise Smart expressed her gratitude to community members who have reached out to the family over the years since her daughter's disappearance.

"To this day, the support we get from you is the strength that helps us move forward," Denise Smart said as she turned to the crowd. "Kristin would never give up anything, and we had to follow that legacy and we refused to give up until there was justice."

Kristin Smart graduated from Lincoln High School in 1995. At the time of her disappearance, she was nearing the end of her freshman year of college.

"Your city loves you, supports you, and will never forget Kristin," Lincoln told the Smarts on stage. "Thank you for the ways in which you've allowed her legacy to live on."

Record reporter Hannah Workman covers news in Stockton and San Joaquin County. She can be reached at hworkman@recordnet.com or on Twitter @byhannahworkman. To support local news, subscribe to The Stockton Record at https://www.recordnet.com/subscribenow.

This article originally appeared on The Record: Stockton mayor gives Kristin Smart's parents Key to the City award