Smart disappeared on the way home from an off-campus party on May 25, 1996.
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Kristin Smart, 19, of Stockton was last seen near her dorm, authorities said. She did not have identification, money or extra clothing when she disappeared. A massive excavator will aid the search of three areas on the steep terrain near the dormitories.
The work was being done on a hillside west of the giant letter “P” that marks the campus in the coastal region midway between San Francisco and Los Angeles. She was declared legally dead in 2002.
The sheriff said authorities are not any closer to making an arrest than they were in the past.
Campus police were slow in filing a missing persons report because they believed that Smart had simply gone on an impromptu vacation.
Being mindful of the impact to Cal Poly, the sheriff’s office chose to conduct the excavation before the fall quarter began.
The sheriff’s office has never stopped investigating the case, he said.
Parkinson said Tuesday that the campus dig was the result of a lead that was developed during a comprehensive review over the past two years by a new sheriff’s detective assigned to the case full time.
Excavators worked at three locations at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo on Wednesday as the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Sheriff’s Office look for the remains of former Cal Poly student Kristin Smart.
“…the dogs, two Springer spaniels and a German shepard mix, keyed in on the three areas after being brought to the site from the FBI’s Quantico facility”. They’re trained at Civil War burial sites in Virginia. He described her as drunk and said she had to stop several times. “It’s our hope and desire that this leads to some of the answers (to questions) that we’ve been asking the last 20 years, what happened to Kristin”.
Parkinson said, “Until it’s done, we want to continue to manage our expectations”.
Investigators are looking into several locations for her remains, but are only releasing details on one since it’s a “high profile” location.
According to the FBI, Smart was last seen alive around 2 a.m. on May 25, 1996, by a fellow student, Paul Flores, who told police following her disappearance that he parted company with her about a block from her dorm.
“They’ve had those might-be’s before, I know it’s a lot”, graduate student Jason Colombini told CNN affiliate KYET. “It’s very hot out here, they’re working under some backbreaking conditions, so we’re very pleased so far with day one”.
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In a statement, Smart’s family said they were “encouraged and hopeful for the new developments” in the case. “When you have a missing child you don’t have that privilege”.
