Orlando police have arrested Dale Smith Jr., 55, on a charge of second-degree murder in connection with the 2011 disappearance of his then-fiancée, Michelle Parker. The arrest came Wednesday, 15 years after Parker was last seen.
Parker’s body has never been found, but Orlando Police Department investigators said “all evidence leads to Dale Smith Jr. as the person responsible for Michelle’s murder.”
Parker vanished on Nov. 17, 2011, after dropping off her twins with Smith. That same afternoon, a prerecorded episode of “The People’s Court” aired in which Parker and Smith settled a dispute over a $5,000 engagement ring. In the televised proceeding, Parker described Smith as someone who “gets pretty malicious and vindictive,” and recounted that “he said that he wanted his ring, so I took it off, and I threw it at him.” Friends of the couple had previously described their relationship as tumultuous.
Parker was reported missing after she failed to show up for work. Her brother, Dustin, texted to ask where she was and received an immediate one-word reply: “Waterford.” Family members said the response alarmed them because Parker would never answer with a single word.
Her Hummer was found abandoned several days later near an apartment complex west of the Mall at Millenia. A decal advertising her airbrush-tanning business had been removed from the vehicle. A dive team later recovered Parker’s iPhone from a lake roughly four miles from her home.
Smith was considered a prime suspect for years, but police said they lacked sufficient evidence to charge him until recently. Investigators credited “years of investigative work and a renewed, focused effort over the past year,” pointing to an expanded investigative team that reexamined old evidence using advances in digital forensics.
Detective Phil McMickin told reporters Wednesday that Smith had been questioned repeatedly over the years and had also given depositions related to the case.
“The suspect was interviewed more than once, and since then has taken part in depositions related to this case, and very specific questions were asked of him numerous times over the years where he gave different answers to those same questions,” McMickin said.
Attempts to reach Smith’s defense attorney for comment were not immediately successful.
