Kristin Smart case: Retired chief DA investigator recounts interviews with Paul Flores
During a preliminary hearing for two men accused in the murder of Cal Poly student Kristin Smart, a San Luis Obispo Superior Court judge denied a motion Friday to include evidence of defendant Paul Flores allegedly engaging in sexual misconduct.
Superior Court Judge Craig van Rooyen said the evidence, which the prosecution moved to have included in the hearing Friday, creates a risk of prejudice against Flores’ character, while having “limited relevance” to the murder charges.
The evidence included rape fantasy pornography, home videos and statements from multiple alleged survivors.
The San Luis Obispo County District Attorney’s Office previously pushed for additional rape charges for Flores at the start of the hearing using much of the same evidence, but that too was denied with van Rooyen saying evidence of a sexual assault in the Smart murder case was “weak.”
But van Rooyen did allow into evidence roughly 40 minutes of a two-hour video recording of Paul Flores’ June 19, 1996, interview with two District Attorney’s Office investigators.
Flores’ defense had objected to the video’s admission, arguing that the investigators in effect held Flores and wouldn’t allow him to leave even though he asked several times.
Van Rooyen found that, within the 40- to 50-minute video clip that Deputy District Attorney Chris Peuvrelle was seeking to admit, Flores had volunteered the interview and should have reasonably known he could leave the interview.
The judge noted that the interview turned into something more akin to an interrogation.
The video will be accepted as evidence only for the purposes of the preliminary hearing, van Rooyen said.
Legal arguments and witness testimony continued Friday in the month-long preliminary hearing in the case against Paul Flores and his father, Ruben Flores, following a 2-day break this week.
The District Attorney’s Office alleges Smart was murdered by Paul Flores, now 44, during a rape attempt in his residence hall room more than 25 years ago.
Flores is the last person known to have seen the 19-year-old freshman alive after walking her back from a house party toward the Cal Poly campus residence halls on May 24, 1996.
Smart’s body has never been found but investigators believe her remains were buried at the Arroyo Grande home of 80-year-old Ruben Flores and recently moved.
Friday marks the 11th day of the evidentiary hearing for Paul and Ruben Flores; Peuvrelle said in court Friday he believes the prosecution will rest its case Sept. 3.
Paul Flores, a San Pedro resident, is charged with one count of murder. His father is charged with felony accessory after the fact.
More than a dozen people — including Smart’s parents and former friends and classmates of Smart and Paul Flores, as well as current and retired San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Office and Cal Poly campus detectives, Flores’ ex-girlfriend and a cadaver dog expert — have testified since the hearing began Aug. 2.
At a scheduled hearing Wednesday, the court paused hearings until Friday so that the prosecution and defense could work out new discovery issues.
At the conclusion of the preliminary hearing, van Rooyen will rule whether prosecutors established probable cause — a lesser standard of proof than guilt beyond a reasonable doubt — to proceed the case toward trial.
Here’s what’s happened in court Friday.
Judge denies use of evidence related to sexual misconduct
A prosecution motion previously unsealed in the case alleges that at least 29 women had told investigators that Flores engaged in some form of sexual misconduct with them. Four of the women claim they were raped after being drugged at bars and at Flores’ San Pedro home, according to the records.
Friday morning, the court took up a motion Peuvrelle filed to include alleged evidence of Paul Flores allegedly engaging in sexual misconduct.
In his argument, Peuvrelle stated that witnesses said they saw Kristin Smart with a red Solo cup while attending the party on Crandall Way next to campus.
Between an hour and an hour-and-a-half later, she was “passed out in the dirt,” the prosecutor said, implying that Paul Flores drugged her.
Peuvrelle then presented statements made by other women who said they were drugged and raped by Flores.
“It’s virtually the exact same MO in each of these cases,” Peuvrelle said, arguing that Flores’ tactic was to drug women, offer to take them home and then rape them.
Peuvrelle then described rape fantasy porn found on Flores’ computer during a February 2020 search of his San Pedro home, which depicted a man breaking into a woman’s home, putting a cloth over her mouth and raping her.
“Anyone who would repeat that and have an interest in that ... (it) is relevant to proving the intent to rape,” Peuvrelle said.
On Friday, defense attorney Robert Sanger, who is representing Paul Flores, said that the evidence submitted by the prosecution is not related to the murder, so it should not be used in the hearing.
He also said that it’s unfair to link the Smart case to the other women who said they were drugged.
“Saying it’s his MO is way overboard,” he said.
Van Rooyen denied the motion, saying the evidence did not relate to the murder charge, and ran the risk of reflecting badly on Paul Flores’ character.
Chief DA investigator testifies about Paul Flores interviews
On Friday afternoon, William Hanley, who was chief investigator for the District Attorney’s Office and head of the agency’s investigative bureau in 1996, took the stand to recount his interviews with Flores before the then-student stopped cooperating with authorities.
Hanley, who retired in 2018, recalled that he and former District Attorney’s Office Investigator Larry Hobson — who drew a confession from San Luis Obispo serial killer Rex Krebs just a few years later — were contacted by Cal Poly police about a week after that agency took a missing persons report for Smart.
They reached out to Flores on May 31, 1996, to meet at the campus police department building and Flores showed up from his job at the campus store within 15 minutes, Hanley said.
Flores was initially very helpful and answered the investigators’ questions, Hanley said.
In that initial interview, Flores said he only had an introduction with Smart at the Crandall party, but that he “didn’t like those types of girls,” Hanley said.
Flores described walking Smart to a location on Perimeter Road in between their two separate dorms, and last recalled seeing her walk off toward her room, Hanley said.
“So he told you she walked off on her own power essentially?” Peuvrelle asked Hanley. “That’s correct,” he responded.
When Hanley asked during the interview why Flores didn’t walk Smart the final stretch to her room, Flores “said he didn’t even think about it,” Hanley said.
The investigator also testified that Flores had an injury — described as “the later stages of a black eye” — when he met with the investigators on May 31, 1996,, and explained that he was elbowed in the face at a basketball game on Memorial Day 1996, three days after Smart’s disappearance.
At the conclusion of that interview, Hanley asked Flores what he thought happened to Smart.
Flores predicted “that she went off with somebody,” and that “he said he thinks she’s dead,” Hanley said.
The court then took up arguments about whether to enter into evidence a video of Hanley and Hobson’s second interview with Flores on June 19, 1996. During that interview, Flores repeatedly asked whether he could leave, while the investigators did their best to keep him talking.
Van Rooyen said he would allow the 40-minute clip to be entered as evidence for the hearing’s purposes only.
Testimony in the prelminary hearing resumes Monday morning, with witnesses expected to include two San Luis Obispo Police Department detectives and the District Attorney’s Office’s current lead investigator in the case.
This story was originally published August 20, 2021 at 1:31 PM.
