State doctors say a 25-year-old Louisiana woman accused of attempting to impersonate Arkansas’ most well-known missing person is fit for trial, according to a report presented Thursday in Pulaski County Circuit Court.
Tonya Renee Smith’s attorney, Public Defender Bill Simpson, told Judge Leon Johnson that he and his client would not challenge the findings by clinical psychologist Ed Stafford, who evaluated Smith’s mental health on behalf of the Arkansas State Hospital at her lawyer’s request. A trial date has not been set. Smith has been jailed since her arrest.
Smith, who is 7 1/2 months pregnant, is charged with computer fraud, a Class D felony that carries up to six years in prison.
She’s accused of trying to purchase from the state Department of Health a copy of the birth certificate of Morgan Nick, a 6-year-old Ozark girl abducted from an Alma park in June 1995, for whom a child-abduction emergency alert system is named.
The purchase request triggered an investigation because the Health Department keeps tabs on requests for documents of people who have been reported missing.
Smith is eight months older than Morgan. Smith was arrested in August byArkansas State Police agents in Branson, and then was extradited to Arkansas. She is also wanted on a probation violation in Louisiana for a hot-checks conviction.
Authorities say her birthcertificate request came shortly after the 17th anniversary of Morgan’s disappearance. Birth and death certificates are not public records, except in very limited circumstances outlined in Arkansas Code 20-18-305. Exceptions are made for birth certificates that are at least 100 years old and death records at least 50 years old.
Smith has denied wrongdoing, and court records indicate that she blames her arrest on a friend who had allowed her to use her computer.
According to Stafford’s mental evaluation, Smith is competent for trial, meaning she is capable of assisting in her defense and shows no indications that she is mentally ill.
The psychologist found that Smith is of average intelligence. He wrote that he could diagnose her with adjustment disorder, an anxiety condition brought on by stress over her ongoing incarceration.
The twice-married Smith has gestational diabetes and high blood pressure, according to the report. She described using crystal methamphetamine from ages 13-16 and told the doctor that she’d last consumed alcohol on New Year’s Eve 2011.
Her husband was working in Branson when she was arrested there, a couple of months after she was placed on probation in Louisiana, according to the report.
Smith is a 10th-grade dropout from Elmer, La. She reported that she had beenworking for about five years as a home-health aide in Alexandria, La., studying to get her high school diploma and taking remedial college courses at the time of her arrest.
Morgan’s mother, Colleen Nick, has established a foundation named after the girl to assist parents of missing children and advocate on their behalf. The foundation’s website is morgannickfoundation.com.
Each year, the Arkansas State Police broadcasts six to eight public bulletins - known as Morgan Nick AMBER alerts - said police spokesman Bill Sadler. Requests for such alerts always come from local law-enforcement officials, he said.
Most of alerts are Level 2 bulletins for children missing under circumstances, such as custody cases, that don’t appear to leave them at risk of immediate harm, he said. Level 1 alerts are issued for children considered to be in immediate danger. The agency maintains a web page about the alerts at www.ark. org/asp/alerts/mnaa/index. php.
Northwest Arkansas, Pages 9 on 02/22/2013