True crime podcast helped police track murder suspect
US POLICE have said a podcaster’s efforts helped them track down a suspect in the killing of California college student Kristin Smart nearly 25 years ago.
Chris Lambert detoured from his musical career three years ago to create a podcast about Ms Smart’s disappearance in 1996, when she was aged 19.
San Luis Obispo County Sheriff Ian Parkinson said Mr Lambert’s efforts helped bring forward witnesses that led this week to the arrest of Paul Flores and his father Ruben, who have appeared in court over the disappearance.
Mr Lambert said he never expected the results he achieved. Meanwhile, his podcast, Your Own Backyard, hit 7.5 million downloads on Thursday. It was the number two podcast on iTunes.
He said a billboard on the side of the road on California’s Central Coast led him on a detour three years ago from his career as a singer-songwriter and recording engineer.
The 33-year-old says the podcast has taken over his life, saying: “I can’t step away from it for more than a few days.
“I just get sucked right back in because I want to be resolving things.”
It was an unlikely turn for someone who refers to himself as a shy “random boy with a beard”, and it has produced results he never imagined.
On Tuesday, as San Luis Obispo County Sheriff Ian Parkinson announced the arrests, he credited Mr Lambert with helping draw worldwide attention to the case and bringing forward several key witnesses.
Flores, a long-time suspect in the case, and Ms Smart were fellow first-year students at the California Polytechnic State University campus in San Luis Obispo.
Now 44, Flores has been charged with murdering the 19-year-old while trying to rape her in his dorm room, prosecutors said.
His father, Ruben Flores, 80, was charged as an accessory after authorities said he helped hide Ms Smart’s body, which has never been located.
Paul Flores’ lawyer has declined to comment on the criminal charge. A lawyer for Ruben Flores said his client is innocent.
Despite the podcast’s success, all the attention is not leading to any money for Mr Lambert – he takes no advertising for the broadcast, relying instead on donations.
His is the latest in a line of true-crime podcasts to play a role in an arrest, a court appeal or even an exoneration.
Up And Vanished led to a man confessing to the killing of a Georgia beauty queen, while
Serial helped a convicted murderer win a new trial in Maryland. In The Dark unearthed new evidence.
Mr Lambert was just eight when Ms Smart vanished a short drive up the coast from his own home in the small town of Orcutt, about 140 miles northwest of Los Angeles.
It scared him that someone had gone missing, and no-one knew what happened.
For more than two decades, a billboard featuring a photograph of a grinning Ms Smart advertised a $75,000 (£54,000) reward for information over the case. It is located in the town of Arroyo Grande, where Paul Flores grew up and where his parents still live.
Mr Lambert passed the billboard many times, and it ultimately motivated him to start investigating.
“What Chris did with the podcast was put it out nationally to bring in new information,” Sheriff Parkinson said.
“It did produce some information I believe was valuable.”