While Kristin Smart was killed in 1996, her murderer, Paul Flores, wasn’t convicted of the crime until nearly three decades later in 2022. On Us Weekly’s Uncovered, investigative journalist Kristin Thorne explained how the testimonies of two women ultimately helped convict him of Smart’s murder.
Smart was murdered at the age of 19 on the California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo campus, where she was a student. Flores, a fellow classmate at the school, was the last person to be seen with Smart before she disappeared. They had left a party together.
More than two decades later, Flores was arrested in 2021. He was sentenced to 25 years to life in prison in March 2023 after a jury found him guilty of murdering Smart. Her body has never been found.
San Luis Obispo Tribune reporter Chloe Jones spoke to Thorne about the case and trial. During the trial, two women who said they were raped by Flores testified about their experiences.
“The testimonies of the women who said that they were raped by Paul Flores after Kristin was murdered were very powerful. It really connected with the jury, and it really connected with the gallery,” Jones said. “They were both extremely affected by it, and they also experienced very similar patterns of behavior, where they kind of were pursued by Paul at a bar. Paul gave them a drink. They essentially blacked out, got really dizzy and woke up at some point with Paul on top of them.”
During one of the testimonies, one woman said she had a ball gag in her mouth when she was raped by Flores.
“I think that was testimony that was really impactful,” Jones continued. “In my conversation with the jurors after the sentencing, they actually said the two women who testified did impact their decision-making in finding Paul guilty.”
Amid the investigation, prosecutors obtained a search warrant and were able to go through Flores’ computer. Jones said that they found videos of Flores having sex with “women who appeared to be unconscious.”
One of the videos also showed a woman who was ball gagged, and Jones explained that the judge allowed the prosecutor to share one photo of the woman during the trial.
The jurors told Jones that the testimonies and the video evidence “established a pattern of behavior” of Flores since the women described as being incapable of consent at the time of their encounters with him.
“Based off of the people who witnessed Kristin at the party the night that she disappeared, she was incredibly intoxicated and incredibly incoherent and unable to consent and could barely walk,” Jones explained.
Two years after Flores’ conviction, his attorneys filed an appeal to overturn the conviction, arguing that “the two women who testified” against Flores “should not have been allowed to do that” and that “the jury never should have heard that testimony,” Jones explained.
Before the first appeal was denied in October 2025, Flores’ attorneys filed a second appeal to overturn the case. The second appeal was denied in January.
Flores has consistently said that he did not kill Smart.
