Prosecutors find convicted murderer Paul Flores’ appeal meritless

April 19, 2025

By KAREN VELIE

Paul Flores, the former Cal Poly San Luis Obispo student who was convicted in the 1996 murder of Kristin Smart, last fall appealed his conviction claiming judicial error. State prosecutors responded on April 14 with a brief that calls the appeal meritless.

In 2022, a jury found that Flores murdered Smart during an attempted rape following a Cal Poly frat party. After the party, Flores helped escort Smart, who was found passed out on a lawn outside the party, back to her dorm room. She was never seen again.

Flores, the primary suspect in the case, was sporting a black eye when interviewed by law enforcement who determined he lied repeatedly. Even so, it would be years before Flores faced charges.

After the jury found Flores guilty of murdering Smart, Monterey County Superior Court Judge Jennifer O’Keefe sentenced Flores to 25 years to life in prison.

In its brief, the California Attorney Generals Office’s listed its evidence:

• Flores showed that he was romantically interested in Smart, but she had no interest in him.
• On the night Smart disappeared, Flores continued to show interest in her, and he was the last person seen with her prior to the disappearance.
• Flores was seen with a black eye shortly after Smart went missing, and he acted strangely when asked by others about his eye or Smart’s disappearance.
• Upon being interviewed by the police, Flores lied about his romantic interest in Smart, the amount of contact he had with her at the party, and the cause of his black eye.
• During the summer of 1996, Flores called Smart a “dick tease,” and he admitted to having buried her underground.
• Four dogs, which had been trained and certified in locating human remains, separately searched the Santa Lucia dorm and passed numerous rooms before alerting the irrespective handlers that someone had died in Flores’ room.
• Flores and his father kept people away from the deck at the father’s home on White Court.
• Flores failed to respond when his mother suggested that he might not be able to “punch holes” in a podcaster’s accusation that he was responsible for Smart’s disappearance.
• In 2021, two dogs, which had been certified in finding human remains, detected the presence of remains under the deck of the Flores home.
• Ground penetrating radar showed that an area under the Flores’ deck had been dug by hand with dimensions that were consistent with a human grave.
• Under the deck, at a depth of about four feet, the soil contained some blood as well as some fibers, both cotton and synthetic.
• A few months after the search of the ground under the deck, Flores’ father admitted having committed a felony.
• There are uncharged crimes – appellant allegedly raped two women after giving them a roofie or another drug to render them unconscious.

Flores’ appeal accuses the judge of violating Flores’ Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights by repeatedly declining to remove a juror “who had lost her ability to remain neutral and abide by her oath.”

During the trial, juror 273 became emotional and later told a bailiff she was starting to view Flores as guilty, according to the appeal. On two other occasions, the same juror told the court she was experiencing anxiety because of Flores’ attorney Robert Sanger’s aggressive questioning of prosecution witnesses. Sanger repeatedly asked the judge to dismiss juror 273.

Prosecutors argue that there is substantial evidence that juror 273 could be fair and impartial.

“The uncharged rapes were admissible under Evidence Code section 1108 because the charging document alleged that appellant killed Smart during the commission of a rape or attempted rape, each of which constituted a qualifying sexual offense under the statute,” according to the prosecutors’ brief.

Flores’ appeal also argues the judge should not have allowed two women who said Flores raped them to testify because there was no evidence Flores raped or attempted to rape Smart.

“As the prosecutor made no threshold showing that appellant committed a sexual offense against Smart, the trial court abused its discretion by admitting the uncharged offense evidence,” according to the appeal. “By admitting this irrelevant and extraordinarily prejudicial testimony, the trial court abused its discretion and committed reversible error.”

Prosecutors argue Flores’ “claim lacks merit because the charging document alleged that appellant raped or attempted to rape Smart during the commission of the murder,” according to the prosecutors’ brief. “Because a qualifying sexual crime was alleged, Evidence Code section 1108 necessarily applied.”

The appeal also accuses the judge of giving the jury two “erroneous instructions” on attempted rape of an intoxicated person.

Prosecutors argue Flores is precluded from raising the claim that the instructions allowed the jury to find that he attempted to rape an intoxicated person without finding that he attempted to have intercourse with an intoxicated person.

“The described errors deprived appellant of the fair trial to which due process entitled him,” according to Flores’ appeal. “He, therefore, asks this court to reverse his murder conviction or, alternatively, reduce the crime to second degree murder.”

In their brief, prosecutors argue that whether considered separately or in combination, the few errors that occurred during Flores’ trial were “inconsequential.” 

“Flores was entitled to a fair trial, not a perfect one,” according to the prosecutors’ brief. “Flores received a fair trial.”

Prosecutors are asking the appellate court to affirm Flores’ murder conviction.

Flores, 48, is currently serving his sentence at California State Prison in Corcoran.

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