In 2011, Michelle Parker, a 33-year-old mother of three, appeared on a reality TV show, The People’s Court, along with her ex-partner Dale Smith Jr to settle their argument over the engagement ring. The disputed ring was worth $5,000 and Parker said on the show that Smith got malicious and vindictive. “He said that he wanted his ring, so I took it off, and I threw it at him,” Parker said on the show, which was telecast on November 17, 2011 — the last time Parker was ever seen. The episode was recorded earlier and the day it was shown, Parker came to Smith to drop off her twins. Smith was the last person to see her but it took the police 15 years to arrest him. Parker’s body was never found.Parker filed for a domestic violence injunction against Smith in August 2009, alleging that he smashed her truck window during an argument while holding their young daughter.
Dale Smith Jr being arrested 15 years after Michelle Parker’s disappearance.
Years of examining and re-examining evidence
The day after her disappearance, Parker’s car was recovered on the west side of Orlando, with the decal for her tanning business scraped off its window. Her cellphone was recovered from a lake south of Orlando, police said. Smith was considered a prime suspect at the time, but he was not charged until Wednesday. He has previously denied involvement in her disappearance.But advancements in technology helped reveal new information from cars, electronic devices, phones and computers. And Smith gave conflicting statements over the years.“We were able to better interpret that evidence today than what we were able to do back in 2011,” detective Philip McMican said. Digital forensics revealed more detailed location data and communications between devices used then, he said.Parker’s mother said it was the happiest day after Smith was arrested, as she had been holding on to hope throughout the years. “I just knew that one day everything dark would come into the light,” she said. “And it’s been hard, let me tell you. It’s not easy to lose a child this way. And her children didn’t deserve to lose a mother this way,” she said. Parker’s eldest child is now 26 and her twins are 18.
