Imagine living your life, marrying and having children, and all the time you had a deep, dark secret that your family and friends would never believe. It was something you hoped to take to your grave.
However, every day, you worried and waited for the day police would show up at your door with handcuffs to arrest you.
Squeaky clean, except for the one thing that no one else knew about: the night you brutally killed a complete stranger in Virginia.
One day, Stephan Smerk’s worst fear came true.
When he answered the knock at his door in New York, two police detectives stood in front of him. Stone-faced, shocked, Smerk willingly gave his DNA when they told him the reason they had come.
Smerk knew he was finally caught, nearly 30 years after entered a stranger’s home on Reseca Lane, and in a violent rage, stabbed a stranger 49 times.
The victim: A mother and artist
The victim, artist and mother Robin Warr Lawrence, 37, was home alone on a cold night in Springfield when Smerk went to her home, intent on killing someone, anyone.
There weren’t any easy leads for police: there was no evidence of sexual assault or a burglary. Her husband, who police initially honed in on, had been out of the country in the Bahamas.
As years went by without finding her killer, Fairfax County detectives took advantage of new technology to try to solve the case, They felt sure they had the killer’s blood on a washcloth from the home, but even with that, time after time, they came up empty.
After the DNA tests couldn’t pinpoint a suspect, genetic genealogy was used to find relatives of the killer; matches were found, but they were unfortunately very distant.
The company running the test, Parabon NanoLabs, gave law enforcement a zero chance of solvability based on the data.
A volunteer at the police department didn’t agree with the lab. Over the course of three years, she kept going back to the family tree, trying to find a person that met the profile of the killer.
One day, she found someone who was a potential match and lived in Virginia in 1994.
Smerk had been in the U.S. Army stationed at the now Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall in Arlington when Lawrence was killed. He had a clean record, so detectives had serious doubts that this was their killer.
While it was a long shot, Fairfax County Police detectives took a trip to New York to get Smerk’s DNA in September 2023 to rule him out.
Detectives knocked on his door and told them why they were there; he was “stone-faced.” He gave his DNA willingly, and detectives left.
When the officers got back to their hotel, they were surprised to get a call from Smerk; he told the detectives he was at the police station ready to turn himself in.
Confession: ‘I am a serial killer’
The bizarre cold case, which includes the police interview with Smerk, is part of a “48 Hours” special on CBS tonight. It is also available on streaming on Paramount+.
Smerk’s chilling confession revealed a cold-blooded murderer who was deadset on killing someone on that fateful night. Smerk told detectives he left his barracks intent on killing.
Her house was chosen completely at random.
“There could have been 50 people in that house. I don’t know. They could have all had guns and shot me dead. I wasn’t even thinking about that,” Smerk said.
ICYMI
- ‘Yogurt Shop Murders’ | Evidence in 1991 murder case linked to serial killer
- Nelson County: 1998 missing person case now reclassified as homicide
- Cold case: Police announce arrest of Newport News man in 2017 double homicide
- Richmond Police seek information on person of interest in cold case
- Cold case: Incarcerated suspect indicted by grand jury in 2003 murder of Roanoke man, dog
He told detectives that if it wasn’t for his wife and kids, he would have killed again.
“I am a serial killer who’s only killed once,” Smerk told police.
Smerk expressed no remorse for the random break-in and murder; he only felt bad for himself and potential consequences from his actions.
“I don’t feel anything for the family,” he said. “I feel bad that I did it because I knew someday my personal freedom would be affected.”
Detective Jon Long told CBS that the indiscriminate murder was everyone’s “worst nightmare.”
“That’s the reason why you tell like your loved ones to make sure that your doors are locked at night. He is the boogeyman.”
Smerk, 53, pleaded guilty last October and was sentenced in March to 70 years in prison.
CBS: ‘Closing the Cold Case of Robin Lawrence’
Support AFP
Share
Crystal Graham
