Eric Smith was thirteen years old when he murdered a four year old child. According to court documents Smith was tired of being bullied and decided to focus his anger on the four year old child who he lured to a forest area and struck the boy repeatedly with a rock. Smith would be found guilty of murder and sentenced to nine years to life in prison. This teen killer has been denied parole repeatedly since 2002. Eric Smith was granted parole in 2021 and released from prison in February 2022
Eric Smith 2022 Information
| DIN (Department Identification Number) | 01A0430 |
| Inmate Name | SMITH, ERIC M |
| Sex | MALE |
| Date of Birth | 01/22/1980 |
| Race / Ethnicity | WHITE |
| Custody Status | IN CUSTODY |
| Housing / Releasing Facility | WOODBOURNE |
| Date Received (Original) | 01/22/2001 |
| Date Received (Current) | 01/22/2001 |
| Admission Type | NEW COMMITMENT |
| County of Commitment | STEUBEN |
| Latest Release Date / Type (Released Inmates Only) |
| Aggregate Minimum Sentence | 0009 Years, 00 Months, 00 Days |
| Aggregate Maximum Sentence | LIFE Years, 99 Months, 99 Days |
| Earliest Release Date | 10/2021 |
| Earliest Release Type | PAROLE HEARING DATE |
| Parole Hearing Date | 10/2021 |
| Parole Hearing Type | REAPPEARANCE |
| Parole Eligibility Date | 08/06/2002 |
| Conditional Release Date | NONE |
| Maximum Expiration Date | LIFE |
Eric Smith Other News
For the ninth straight time, child killer Eric Smith was denied parole.
Smith, who was convicted of killing 4-year-old Derrick Robie in Steuben County in August 1993, went before the parole board last week. The state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision on Friday announced that the board again denied Smith’s parole.
Smith, now 38, is in the medium-security Collins Correctional Facility in Erie County, about 25 miles south of Buffalo where he is serving nine years to life in prison. He has been incarcerated for two dozen years.
Eric Smith was 13 when he lured Robie into a wooded area near the boy’s Savona home. Derrick was walking alone to a summer camp at a nearby park. Smith strangled Derrick, smashed his head with a rock and sodomized him with a stick.
During the April 10 interview with a parole board, Smith said he had, for years, held in a lot of anger due to years of being bullied, according to the parole documents.
“The panel is gravely concerned with the fact that you released your anger on an innocent, vulnerable 4-year-old boy who was cared for by his loving family,” wrote state parole board commissioner Carol Shapiro. “He was simply walking to his summer camp that he enjoyed and looked forward to playing kickball games.”
While Eric Smith has participated in “positive programming” while incarcerated, volunteers with the chaplain and has repeatedly apologized for his actions, “it does not outweigh the severity of your brutal crime,” Shapiro said.
Smith was housed in a juvenile facility until 2001, when he was transferred to state prison. His lawyer at the time of his trial tried to persuade a jury that Smith suffered from a mental disorder, but Smith was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to nine years to life in prison.
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Eric Smith was paroled from prison in February 2022
Eric Smith Parole 2021
Eric M. Smith, who was 13 when he killed a 4-year-old boy with a rock in western New York, has been granted parole, corrections officials said on Saturday.
Smith, now 41, appeared for the 11th time before the Board of Parole on October 5 and was granted release as early as Nov. 17, the Department of Corrections and Community Supervision said in an emailed statement.
Transcripts of the hearing were not immediately released
Smith was convicted of second-degree murder in 1994 for luring Derrick Robie into woods near the younger boy’s home and striking his head with a rock. Derrick was walking alone to summer camp at a park in the Steuben County village of Savona in August 1993.
The case got wide publicity because of the tender age of the victim and suspect, along with a widely circulated photo of the adolescent Smith in court, wearing a Bugs Bunny sweatshirt and a mop of red hair.
Smith’s lawyer unsuccessfully argued that he was mentally ill. Smith was sentenced to nine years to life in prison.
Derrick’s parents, Dale and Doreen Robie, opposed Smith’s release each time it was previously considered and have lobbied for parole reforms that include extending the time between hearings for violent offenders from the current two years to five.
Dale Robie told local media the family did not want to comment on the latest decision.
Smith is housed at the medium-security Woodbourne Correctional Facility in the Catskills.
Eric Smith Released From Prison
A New York man who killed a 4-year-old boy with a rock in 1993 when he was 13 years old has been released from prison after being granted parole last October, authorities said Tuesday.
Eric M. Smith, 42, was released from the Woodbourne Correctional Facility on Tuesday after serving 28 years for the murder of Derrick Robie, according to the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision’s website.
Authorities said Smith lured the younger boy into a wooded area near the victim’s home in Savona in western New York and beat him to death with a rock.
Smith was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to nine years to life in prison. The case attracted wide attention because the defendant and victim were so young. Smith was granted parole last fall after 10 previous requests were denied.
At his Oct. 5 parole hearing, Smith blamed the attack on pent-up anger from being bullied by other children who targeted him for being short with red hair and glasses.
“After years of reflection, looking at who I was then and what was going on, I essentially became the bully that I disliked in everything else in my life,” Smith said, according to a transcript of the hearing.
Derrick’s parents, Dale and Doreen Robie, opposed Smith’s release each time it was previously considered. A phone number listed for Dale Robie was not in service Tuesday.
Eric Smith told parole officials he hoped to live with his mother initially and then move in with his fiancee. Neither his mother’s address nor his fiancee’s identity was disclosed.
I know the family opposes it but I think it’s a little unfair to keep him locked up this long when the crime was committed at 13
Excuse me??? Why don’t you tell that to the little boy who no longer gets to grow up and get married. Or have kids. The little boy who he conned into the woods and strangled, brutally bashed his head in, poured kool-aid in his skull and didn’t stop there. He sodomized a 4 year old with a stick! Kind of makes me wonder how sick and deranged you are! You should be ashamed of yourself. That little boy was helpless innocent and didn’t deserve what that disturbed man did to him. Whether he was a kid himself, he knew right from wrong. Not to mention he showed no remorse or feeling for what he did. In my opinion the punishment is far better than what it should have been!I have 5 kids and if something like that happened to one of my kids,let’s just say he wouldn’t be walking around in a prison today! So I think he got off way to easy!
He strangled a 4 yr old, hit him with a rock AND SODOMIZED him with a stick. That is a special type of murder. Derrick had no opportunity to grow, have a fiance or any of the benefits of life that being is having. When he looses his temper in the real world as a 6’3″ grown man. We’ll see unfortunately whether or not he was a serial killer in the making or not. But another victim will be added.