there's always more to the story
Remember back in March, when accused rapist Brian Nichols killed four people, escaped, and took a woman hostage who eventually talked him down with pancakes, sharing God, and readings from "The Purpose-Driven Life"? It turns out there was more to the story.
Isn't there always?
For one thing, the much ballyhooed "Purpose-Driven" intervention amounted to reading little more than a paragraph. For another, as indicated in the title of her new book, "Unlikely Angel," Ashley Smith is far from the little angel her faith based pep-talk led many to believe.
Actually she's kind of a low-life who didn't even have custody of the daughter she begged to see and was so strung out she once crashed her car because she let go of the steering wheel when "a voice" told her to "Let go, and let God." (Somehow I doubt that's what the voice had in mind....)
On the night he took her hostage, Smith asked Nichols if he wanted to see the results of taking drugs and lifted up her shirt to show him the scar from that accident. He didn't even have to give her any beads. No beads, she flashes, and gives him drugs. This may be the perfect woman -- for the outlaw biker set.
Perhaps most shocking of all is that on the night he took her hostage, Smith shared her secret methamphetamine stash with Nichols. As she says in an interview with The Book Standard, "I really couldn't believe that I had offered it to him. I was like, 'Oh my God, how could I have done that? Are you crazy? What is wrong with you?' But at the time, it was just what I felt like I had to do. He was asking for drugs, and I had some, and so I thought I might as well go ahead and give him some. But he didn't react the way that I expected him to react. So. Praise God for that."
Now she has a book deal, is shopping around a movie ("Let’s face it—kids don’t like to read," she says) and received $70,000 in reward money. Not bad for a few hours of amateur counseling. But I wonder how some of those who have heralded, praised, and held Ms. Smith up as some sort of faith-filled role model feel after finding out the whole story. I'm disappointed and I didn't even give her $70,000.
I remember at the time a comedian joking that the only thing messed up prisoners need is for Ms. Smith to make them pancakes. "Those must be some pancakes," he said. I wonder if he'll append his material to include a powdered-sugar-like shaker of meth on the side.
I know it'd do wonders for IHOP's business.
Sources:
Hostage Gave Meth to Atlanta Fugitive
Ashley Smith's Secrets Revealed: A Q&A with the Former 'Purpose-Driven' Hostage