Prosecutor says missing student killed during 1996 rape attempt

LOS ANGELES — The suspect in the 1996 disappearance of California college student Kristin Smart killed her while trying to rape her in his dorm room and his father helped hide the body, the San Luis Obispo County district attorney said Wednesday.

District Attorney Dan Dow said prosecutors would seek to prove Paul Flores tried to sexually assault Smart by showing prior sex acts he engaged in and crimes they believe he committed in more recent years.

Prosecutors filed a first-degree murder charge against Paul Flores, 44, and an accessory after murder charge against his father, Ruben Flores, 80, for helping him conceal Smart’s body, which has never been found.

The two were arrested Tuesday after years of investigation and a search last month using ground-penetrating radar and cadaver dogs at the elder Flores’ home that led to evidence connected to Smart’s death, authorities said. They didn’t revealed what was found.

Smart, 19, of Stockton, was last seen May 25, 1996, with Flores while returning to her dorm at California Polytechnic State University campus in San Luis Obispo after an off-campus party. She was inebriated at the time, and Flores, a fellow freshman, had offered to walk her home.

Dow revealed that investigators think Flores killed Smart in his dorm room during the Memorial Day weekend when many students had left the campus.

Investigators, who launched a renewed search Tuesday at his father’s property in nearby Arroyo Grande, believe they know where the body was buried but have not yet found it or disclosed the location.

Paul and Ruben Flores are in jail and scheduled to be arraigned today in San Luis Obispo Superior Court.

A lawyer for Paul Flores declined to comment on the arrest or charges. Harold Mesick, a lawyer for Ruben Flores, told the Los Angeles Times his client is “absolutely innocent.”

Paul Flores has remained mum through the years, invoking his Fifth Amendment right to not answer questions before a grand jury and in a deposition for the lawsuit brought against him.

Susan Flores, the mother of Paul and estranged wife of Ruben, broke years of public silence last month in an interview with KSBY-TV in which she said her family had no role in the death and her son had been a scapegoat.

“They keep trying to find the answers with us and they keep failing because the answers are not here,” she said. “We have no responsibility for her disappearance and what happened to that young woman.”

Susan Flores hung up the phone when contacted by The Associated Press on Tuesday.