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In 1996, Paul's attorney went to the Smart family and proposed a deal with them: allow Paul to plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter and serve a 6-year sentence and an agreement not to pursue him in civil court, and he would lead authorities to Kristen's body.

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Chris wants to hear Paul's input or ask him some questions but is nearly positive he will not speak to him.

In 2019, an interviewer came to his door, but the moment he mentioned Kristen Smart, Paul said, "No, no, no," and retreated back into his house.

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On March 22, 2013, they opened their mailbox to find newspapers from The California Register, something they were not subscribed to.

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He writes for The California Register

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He was most recently working at a coke-a-cola bottling factory.

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She used to work at the Coke-a-Cola factory with Paul. She usually worked the same shift hours as Paul, meaning they often worked together. She was found dead in January of 2007 after working in the factory that night. It was said that she was possibly a witness in a sexual harassment case at the company.

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Paul’s previous coworker claims that he was weird and typically flirted with girls, not taking no for an answer and creepily staring at girls. She explains that Paul continuously insisted on going out to drink with her and that he would take care of her if she got drunk. She filed a sexual harassment case against him, and he shrugged it off.

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His opinion was that Paul buried Kristen in the backyard.

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His papers were written in incredible detail, almost like a crime report.

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Paul Dausty(?) trained dogs that detected human remains. He had a dog, Buster, who had accurately identified more than 35 dead bodies (Buster is trained to detect human-specific chemicals from a decomposing body and is taught to ignore animal remains). David Smallwood got permission from the renters behind Susan Flores’ house and brought both Paul and Buster to search the backyard on June 2, 2014. The dog almost immediately alerted all over the one counter of the backyard, near the concrete.

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Paul then gets permission to go to the house next to Susan's, gets a soil sample, and sends it to the lab so Dr. Vas can analyze it.

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After the dog alerts to the same spot for the second time, Paul reaches out to the police department with the evidence. However, they dismiss the evidence because, technically, the dog's license expired when Paul Dausty retired.

The department also chose not to bring their own cadaver dogs there to search.

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On January 26, 2017, he paid to fly Dr. Vas, the forensic anthropologist from Knoxville, Tennessee, to Royal Grande.

He has a new machine that can detect DNA matches with 85 to 90% accuracy.

They obtain fingernail clippings from Denise Smart and start using the machine (called the inquisitor/gizmo).

Dr. Vas's own design. The instrument is based on resonance frequencies. All objects are made of molecules, and molecules vibrate at a specific frequency. He found a way to amplify the resonance frequency and beam it out into the environment like a weight organ. When it hits an object of similar composition, it excites that object and beams back a signal to a secondary antenna. Then, he can determine whether or not that object is present in the environment.

In this case, they used keratin DNA from Denise Smart's fingernail clippings, which should match Kristen's DNA.

David brings him to the parking lot of Last Chance Liquor and asks him to do a 360 of that area. They got a hit in the back of the house.

They were standing about a half or quarter mile away from the house. It was pointing towards Susan's backyard. They walked up to the street there and went into the parking lot of the condos right behind and do another 360.

They get something there that intersects with the other line right over the rear left corner of the house.

They do another 360, and it intersects again. This doesn't mean the body is still there; however, it can mean that it was there at one point in time.

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His newspapers started to change:

He started blaming officials for not being able to find Kristen

He put "lost" in quotes when talking about the earring

He titled one of his newspaper Kristen Smart's body found? but the Smart family thought it was misleading, and many others missed the question mark at the end of the title

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He continues to write The California Register, which contains inaccurate and misleading information, harmful to the investigation.

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As a control, they take the machine to the Cold Canyon landfill and the Cal Poly P. They do not get a hit at either location.

They do get a hit at the red brick dorm buildings and another in the parking lot of the Sheriff's department. Additionally, they get a hit at an outbuilding that is an evidence locker.

Hard to know where Kristen's body actually was/is without knowing how the machine works. Dr. Vas is hesitant to go into details because the patent is still pending.

The police don't take the California Register seriously.

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Cal Poly and the Sheriff's Department have both worked to cover aspects of this case.

They avoid responding to his claims, and he insists they are both part of a conspiracy, saying David is not a trustworthy source.

He put in formal complaints every year that the sheriff is not doing his job.

Every year he receives a certified letter thanking him for his interest in San Luis Obispo County.

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Believes that the Sheriff's Department has much more information than him and can't share it without jeopardizing the case.

He reflects on the articles he's read:

The Sheriff's Department has refused to comment or share information with the Smart family. They cite an ongoing and active investigation.

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The day after Episode 5 is released, he gets a message from Seattle, Washington, from a guy claiming to be the author and is able to confirm through private information that he is, in fact, the guy they were looking for.

He flew to the Central Coast last week and showed him the exact spot where he and his roommate believed Kristen was buried.

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In February, he was invited to join Denise Smart and two friends, while they sang some of Kristen's favorite songs on the cliffs of Shell Beach, near a spot dubbed the Point of Hope, on what should have been her 42nd birthday.

Received over 300 emails with gratitude and encouragement.

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In 2015, a broadcast journalism major put out a two-part story on the case for Cal Poly’s Mustang News titled “Where is Kristen Smart?”

She was unfamiliar with the case; neither were most of her classmates or other kids at Cal Poly.

During her senior project, while she was doing research into the case, she did a video where she walked around campus and asked people if they knew who Kristen Smart was.

People have no idea or incorrect information about her.

No one says that people are missing during orientation (obviously).

She learned about the case from the California Register.

She interviewed Sheriff Parkinson, attorney James Murphy, and Denise Smart.

Obtains a copy of the 2000 search warrant template and a vide recording of Paul Flores 1997 deposition, which she releases.

Most thorough and well-sourced pieces.

The two-part series was supposed to be four parts, but the faculty department nixed the final two, which included interviews with David Smallwood.

Her faculty editors at Mustang News got really nervous about publishing the information.

She never finished it.

She sends Chris the Google Doc. It's covered in notes from her instructor. For example, he writes, “I have reached his ‘newspaper’ and see many red flags in his coverage”. He highlights whole paragraphs and writes “cut” next to them.

Every mention of Buster, Dr. Vas, and soil samples.

She defends her journalistic choices.

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In 2003, Dennis Mann’s website got an anonymous email from an author who calls himself Ben Franklin.

The tip says to look at Paul’s best friend at the time, who may have more information at the time than he admitted to.

Ben Franklin claims to have worked with Paul at the 76 station over the summer of 1996.

After four tips, he disappears. But Dennis finds an expert who’s able to track the author’s IP Address to the computer lab at Sonoma State University, Dennis contacts IT director, a man named Barry, and asks him to cross-check a list of students and faculty with a list of Paul’s co-workers from the 76 station.

There is one name that appears in both, but he is unable to reveal it without being subpoenaed.

He gives the name to the Sheriff’s department, but it is a dead end (told years later).

No investigators ever contacted Barry. According to Barry, even if the university contacted someone else at the university, the person would have had to come to him for the information and that never happened.

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The smarts pursued a subpoena Duce’s tecum, which sought the disclosure for the Sheriff’s Department investigative documents from their daughter’s case.

They were denied access to the records, citing an ongoing and active investigation.

The basis for the denial is that the public’s interest in protecting the integrity of the criminal investigation outweighed the Smart Family’s right to disclosure.

Once a year, they had a standing court date to appeal the decision, and every year, they were denied access.

On October 23, 2003 and November 9, 2004, Judge Roger Piquet denies the Smart family access to the documents.

On February 7th, their request is again denied. However, Judge Charles Crandall says that the investigation is particularly slow, “a rapid, if not cold,” and calls for a review.

He calls for a review on September 20, after which the case is now declared cold, unless there is unusual development before then.

Review delayed, but in December 2007, the San Luis Obispo Superior Court ruled that the Sheriff’s office must release their case files to the Smart family.

Before they received the documents, the decision is overturned by the Second District Court of appeal.

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A year younger than Kristen, sat behind her in math class at Lincoln High School in Stockton and graduated in 96.

In math class with Mr. Gray, she was really shy. They were acquaintances.

He thinks that she wishes that she had fun at parties in high school.

After moving to the central coast, he started to look for Kristen →took help from psychics, and researched real estate records.

He ended up in a rural location where Susan Flores had listed at the time that Kristen had disappeared.

Clark put up his own billboard on the 101 and brought out a crew to search the rural area he’d found, chartering a helicopter to fly over the densely forested surroundings. He was convinced the body was there.

Compelling items in the area: buster also alerted in, passed on information to Sheriff’s Department along with the Flores family’s connection to the property.

He pleaded with Paul to come forward and tell everyone what happened.

In 2016, after the Sheriff’s Department announced their intention to excavate the Cal Poly Hillside, instead of following up on this property. Clark decided to hang it up, and threw out all of his papers and files on the case. Others tried to help but became discouraged because law enforcement was no interested in outside assistance.

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Evidence?: Possible Kristin remains in the backyard

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Evidence?: Possible Kristin remains in the backyard

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Dr. Vas created an instrument that analyzed and detected the frequencies of molecules. He gathered nail clippings from Denise Smart and used the keratin DNA as source material for comparison. He used a radar gun and got a signal from the back of Flores' house, possibly indicating that frequencies similar to the keratin DNA found in Denise Smart's fingernails are in the backyard.

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In 2003, someone anonymously contacted sonofsusan.com and suggested Dennis Mann look more into Paul's former best friend. The person called themselves Ben Franklin and claims to have worked with Paul in the summer of 1996. He claimed that Paul's former best friend knew more than he admitted to.

An expert tracks the sender's IP address to a computer lab at Sonoma State University. The IT director, Barry says that a name appears on both a list from Paul's former coworkers and one of the students who used a computer in the lab, however, he can not give out information about students without being subpoenaed.

Dennis gives this information to the police department so they can legally look into it. After a few years, Denise Smart requests a follow up on this lead and the investigators tell her that they looked into it and it was a dead end. So, Dennis calls Barry for more information who claims the police never contacted him.