One of Smart’s kidnappers to get out early

SALT LAKE CITY — A woman convicted of helping a street preacher kidnap Utah teen Elizabeth Smart in 2002 will be freed from prison more than five years earlier than expected, a surprise decision that Smart called “incomprehensible” on Tuesday.

Wanda Barzee, 72, will be released Sept. 19 after the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole determined it had miscalculated the time she was required to serve in prison, board spokesman Greg Johnson said.

Barzee pleaded guilty to helping Brian Mitchell kidnap Smart and keeping her captive for nine months before the teenager was found and rescued. Mitchell is serving a life sentence.

Smart, now 30, said in a statement that she was “surprised and disappointed” to learn that Barzee will be freed next week, given that she hasn’t cooperated with mental-health evaluations and risk assessments and didn’t show up for her own parole hearing.

The board said previously that Barzee, who has been in custody for 15 years from the time she was arrested in March 2003, would be released in January 2024 after it denied her an early parole after a hearing that she chose not to attend.

Her attorney, Scott Williams, who acknowledged that Barzee has been diagnosed with several mental illnesses, said he’s not concerned about Barzee posing a danger to the community, but declined to say why.

AP/The Galveston County Daily News/KELSEY WALLING A car is submerged in floodwater Tuesday in La Marque, Texas. The National Weather Service issued a flash flood watch for the Houston area and parts of Southeast Texas until Tuesday night amid rain and scattered street flooding.