[2] Smith was the principal of Upper Merion Area High School when Reinert and her colleague, William Bradfield, were teachers there during the early to late 1970s.
[4][5] In 1981, Bradfield was tried for allegedly defrauding Reinert by taking $25,000 (equivalent to $0.1 million in 2023) from her and telling her he would invest it in a "high-yielding certificate."
The police also determined that on "the day that Ms. Reinert's body was found, Smith was in Harrisburg, a few miles from the death scene, where he was to be sentenced on firearms and disorderly conduct charges.
Placed in jail at the Delaware County Prison, following his conviction for fraud, Bradfield reportedly told a fellow inmate "that the whole plan of the crime ... was only to involve 'Susan,' but that something had gone wrong," and said "it was a shame the children had to suffer by mistake."
"[5][7] In April 1983, as it was preparing to cover Bradfield's trial for murder, the Philadelphia Daily News described Smith as "an integral piece of the puzzle surrounding Reinert's murder," noting: "In part, the suspicion surrounding Smith can be traced to his own problems with the law, which began Aug. 19, 1978, almost a year before Reinert's death.
"[10] "Smith, Upper Merion high school principal for 12 years, was arrested leaving the Gateway Shopping Center in Tredyffrin Township, Chester County, after he was seen wearing a hood and brandishing two pistols.
During his trial, it was revealed that a green pin that Reinert's daughter, Karen, had been wearing on the day she disappeared "was found under the front passenger seat of Smith's car.
But because of what the Supreme Court deemed outrageous behavior by prosecutors, the justices said another trial would amount to placing Mr. Smith in double jeopardy.
Before the Smith ruling, double jeopardy, which prevents a new prosecution, was found to exist only when defendants were acquitted or when prosecutors had deliberately provoked a mistrial.
"Smith subsequently filed multiple lawsuits against the Pennsylvania State Police and against Joseph Wambaugh, "accusing them of colluding to convict him falsely, but lost all of them, the last one in 2000", according to The New York Times.
[1] Following his release from prison, Smith relocated to Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, where he settled near the Borough of Dallas to be closer to his younger daughter, Char.
He and his second wife, Maureen, became resident administrators of an adult-care facility and subsequently lived in a community for senior citizens in Hunlock Creek.
He reportedly maintained that he was innocent of the Reinert murders until the end of his life, and was buried with full military honors at the Chapel Lawn Burial Park in Dallas, Pennsylvania.
[1][2][5][15] Smith was portrayed by actor Robert Loggia in the two-part, made-for-television movie, Echoes in the Darkness, which was based on Joseph Wambaugh's book by the same name.
[16] The murder case was featured in the pilot episode of the documentary TV series Death By Gossip with Wendy Williams, which aired on Investigation Discovery.