By
Antonio Planas and The Associated Press
A man was found guilty Tuesday in the murder of Kristin Smart, the college student who disappeared in California in 1996. The man's father, accused of disposing of the young woman's body, was found not guilty by a separate jury.
Prosecutors said Paul Flores, 45, killed Smart during
an attempted rape
on May 25, 1996, in his dorm room at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo.
The student was 19 years old.
Specifically, the man was found guilty of first-degree murder and faces a sentence of between 25 years and life in prison.
The sentence is expected to be known on December 9.
The photo released by the FBI shows Kristin Smart, the student at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, who disappeared in 1996. FBI via AP
Ruben Flores, 81, Paul's father, had also been brought to trial accused of complicity for helping to bury the student, dig up her remains and move them from hiding years after the murder.
He was found not guilty after a separate trial.
Father and son heard both verdicts simultaneously on Tuesday, although they were tried by different judges.
Paul Flores during his murder trial at Monterey County Superior Court in Salinas, California, on July 18, 2022. Daniel Dreifuss/AP
Paul Flores had long been considered a suspect in the murder, but prosecutors
arrested him and his father in 2021
, after the investigation into the student's disappearance was reactivated.
Authorities have not found the body of Smart, who was declared dead in 2002.
Prosecutors presented evidence showing Smart's body
may have been buried under cover
behind Ruben Flores' home in Arroyo Grande.
Investigators conducted dozens of searches over more than two decades, but a recent one turned their attention to Ruben Flores' home, located about 12 miles south of Smart's college, known as Cal Poly.
Behind a trellis under the roof of his home on a cul-de-sac on Tally Ho Road, archaeologists working for police in March 2021 found a coffin-sized soil disturbance and also
human blood
, prosecutors said. .
[Kristin Smart Case: Detectives Say Missing Girl Was Buried in the Yard of One of the Suspects]
The blood was too degraded to obtain a DNA sample.
Although a blood expert said that this was human, the test used did not rule out the possibility that it was from a ferret or an ape, although court records indicated that no animal remains had been found there.
Attorney James Murphy had sued Flores on behalf of Smart's parents, alleging that Flores and unidentified accomplices moved the body four days after investigators searched his home in February 2020.
Investigators
did not excavate the cover until more than a year later
.
[Authorities arrest suspect in the murder and abuse of 8-year-old Sophia Mason in California]
San Luis Obispo Superior Court Judge Craig Van Rooyen ordered the son and father to stand trial after a 22-day preliminary hearing in which he determined there was "strong suspicion" that the father and son had committed the crimes. crimes of which they were accused, and that
there was a tomb under the house of Ruben Flores
in which, at some point, Smart's remains were.
Harold Mesick, an attorney representing Ruben Flores, previously said the evidence unearthed was ambiguous and should not be considered evidence of guilt.
