By ELLEN BILTZ
Walter Leon Smith Jr. pleaded guilty this morning in Spotsylvania County Circuit Court to second degree murder in the 2007 death of his sister, Betsy Smith.
Smith, now 18, also pleaded guilty to his sister’s attempted rape as well as malicious wounding in the sledgehammer beating of his 2-year-old neice, Andrea Washington.
All of the guilty pleas came as part of a written plea agreement. Smith was initially charged with first degree murder and rape, but those charges were reduced today by Commonwealth’s Attorney Bill Neely in exchange for Smith’s guilty pleas.
Smith’s defense attorneys, Kristie Kane and Eugene Frost, asked for his sentencing hearing to be scheduled on another date so they could bring in a mental health expert to testify.
Authorities have said that although Smith is legally sane, he has many mental health problems.
According to a mental health evaluation done at the University of Virginia Hospital, Smith suffered from depression and psychosis at the time of his sister’s murder.
Smith was charged Sept. 3, 2007 after Betsy Smith was found dead in her bedroom floor in her parent’s Brock Road home. She was stabbed and beaten with a blunt object, according to the plea agreement.
After she was found by a Spotsylvania detective, Smith admitted to the slaying and said “I did it, I killed her with a sledge hammer,” according to the plea agreement.
Smith also admitted to hitting Washington in the head with the sledge hammer because she started crying, the agreement states. The girl has made a full recovery since the beating that left her with several skull fractures.
Smith will be sentenced April 7 by Judge David H. Beck.
For more on this case, read tomorrow’s Free Lance-Star.