New Hampshire Gov. Kelly Ayotte rejected on Thursday the latest request for a sentence reduction hearing from Pamela Smart, who is serving life in prison for orchestrating the murder of her husband by her teenage student in 1990.
Smart, 57, was a 22-year-old high school media coordinator when she began an affair with a 15-year-old boy who later fatally shot her husband, Gregory Smart, in Derry. The shooter was freed in 2015 after serving a 25-year sentence. Though Smart denied knowledge of the plot, she was convicted of being an accomplice to first-degree murder and other crimes and sentenced to life without parole.
It took until last year for Smart to take full responsibility for her husband’s death. In a video released in June, she said she spent years deflecting blame “almost as if it was a coping mechanism.”
On Wednesday, Smart wrote to Ayotte and the governor’s Executive Council asking for a hearing on commuting her sentence. But Ayotte, a Republican elected in November, said she has reviewed the case and decided it is not deserving of a hearing before the five-member panel.
“People who commit violent crimes must be held accountable to the law,” said Ayotte, a former state attorney general. “I take very seriously the action of granting a pardon hearing and believe this process should only be used in exceptional circumstances.”
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In her letter, Smart said she has spent the last 35 years “becoming a person who can and will be a contributing member of society.” Calling herself “what rehabilitation looks like,” she noted that she has taken responsibility for her husband’s death.
“I have apologized to Gregg’s family and my own for the life taken and for my life denied to my parents and family for all these long years,” she wrote.
Smart’s trial was a media circus and one of America’s first high-profile cases about a sexual affair between a school staff member and a student. The student, William Flynn, testified that Smart told him she needed her husband killed because she feared she would lose everything if they divorced. Flynn and three other teens cooperated with prosecutors and all have since been released.
The case inspired Joyce Maynard’s 1992 book “To Die For” and the 1995 film of the same name, starring Nicole Kidman and Joaquin Phoenix.
A staple of many New Hampshire town fairs, the pig scramble may soon look a little different.
A bill signed into law by Gov. Kelly Ayotte last week requires the commissioner of the state Department of Agriculture to create best practices for any event in which people compete to capture a pig. Those guidelines will be published before the 2027 fair season, so they won’t be in place for any fairs with pig scrambles this year, such as the upcoming Deerfield Fair in the fall.
Generally, a pig scramble involves people of the same age competing to capture pigs that have been let loose in a large pen. Contestants have to catch the pig in a drawstring bag, and the first one to do so can take the pig home.
Rep. Cathryn Harvey, a Democrat from Spofford, is the prime sponsor of the bill. She said each fair has different rules for their pig scrambles, meaning some can be more humane than others. One aspect of the events she hopes will change is the bags pigs are captured in.
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“They’re putting an animal in a plastic bag on a hot summer day,” Harvey said. “It isn’t a great idea.”
Although some fairs already use more breathable bags out of burlap, Joan O’Brien, president of the New Hampshire Animal Rights League, said she’s also seen pigs being kept in plastic bags for long periods of time after the event. Not only would a burlap bag improve the pig’s ability to breathe in the heat, she said, but she also wants fairs to require participants to bring an animal carrier for the trip home. Her organization was ultimately in favor of the legislation.
“If you don’t have a carrier, you should not be allowed to leave your pig lying in a bag,” O’Brien said, adding that some fairs already ask contestants to bring carriers. “You should be taking them right home.”
The Deerfield Fair has implemented another rule that O’Brien and Harvey hope becomes part of statewide best practices — having parents supervise their child in the pen. O’Brien once witnessed a child hang a pig upside down by its legs and then lower it headfirst into the bag.
“In the heat of the moment, the kids get excited and they just do whatever it takes to get the pig in the bag,” O’Brien said. She said parents should work with the event referee to make sure their kid is handling the pig humanely.
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Harvey’s bill originally called for pig scrambles to be banned around the state, but both she and O’Brien feel that universal guidelines for fairs would still make the experience better for the animals. Even seemingly small things, Harvey said, like giving the pigs water after the scramble, would be an improvement to the current situation for them.
“I think that the bill will embolden people to speak up at these events,” O’Brien said. “If they think a pig is being mistreated, they’ll be able to say to themselves, ‘I know that there’s supposed to be a rule, so I’m going to say something.’ So I think that would be a good outcome.”
The New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services collected samples of the unknown substance found in Sunapee Harbor and will be testing them tomorrow. Authorities say the spill was contained and prevented from spreading further.
HAMPSTEAD, N.H. (WHDH) – Authorities have launched an investigation after responding to a reported untimely death in Hampstead, New Hampshire, officials said.
The Attorney General’s Office is investigating the untimely death of a woman at a home in Hampstead, Attorney General John M. Formella announced.
While the investigation is just beginning, there is no known threat to the general public at this time.
The exact circumstances surrounding this incident remain under active investigation.
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