Ashley Smith

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For the Welsh rugby player see Ashley Smith (rugby player)

Ashley Smith was a hostage held by Brian Nichols in her apartment complex located in Duluth, Georgia, over the night of March 11-12, 2005. In an unexpected move, after more than 7 hours of being held hostage, Nichols allowed her to leave her complex upon her claim to visit her daughter. Smith took the opportunity to dial local authorities who summoned the Gwinnett County, Georgia, S.W.A.T. team, who eventually arrested him upon an uneventful surrender.

During her ordeal, Smith read to Nichols from the Bible and from Rick Warren's The Purpose Driven Life. She also cooked him pancakes and gave him crystal methamphetamine, an illegal stimulant, from her personal supply, although she maintains that she did not use the drug along with him. Smith later revealed "that she had been struggling with a methamphetamine addiction when she was taken hostage, and the drug problem had even led to time spent in a psychiatric hospital and the loss of custody of her 5-year-old daughter."[1] Smith said the last time she used crystal meth "was 36 hours before Nichols held a gun to her and entered her home. Nichols wanted her to use the drug with him, but she refused.”[2] Smith also revealed that she had “a five-inch scar down the center of her torso — the aftermath of a car wreck caused by drug-induced psychosis. She says she let go of the steering wheel when she heard a voice saying, ‘Let go and let God.’”[3]

Her husband, Daniel McFarland Smith, had been stabbed to death on August 18, 2001, in Augusta, Georgia.

In March 2006, Corey Coggins was sentenced to life in prison for killing Smith.[4] The case had been reopened after Ashley Smith's ordeal.

Smith had grown up in Augusta, and played high school basketball at Augusta Christian School and Lakeside. As a teenager, she was arrested for petty crimes. In her 20s, she was charged with a DUI. Sometime after her husband was killed, she moved to Atlanta.

While Brian Nichols was still at large, the governor of Georgia, Sonny Perdue, offered a reward of $60,000 for information leading to the capture of the fugitive. As the individual who notified the authorities of Nichols' location, Smith is eligible to receive the reward. On March 15, 2005, Perdue released $10,000 of the reward money. The sum makes up the state's share of the $60,000.

It was announced in June 2005 that Smith had inked a book deal with HarperCollins Publishers. She collaborated with writer Stacy Mattingly on her memoirs, Unlikely Angel: The Untold Story of the Atlanta Hostage Hero. The book came out in September 2005, and Smith revealed her methamphetamine addiction there for the first time. Smith asserts therein that her hostage ordeal awakened her to the fact that she was an addict, and she holds that she has not used drugs since the ordeal.

[edit] Sources

  1. ^ Erin Curry. "Culture Digest: Ashley Smith gave kidnapper crystal meth, she says in book", Baptist Press, Sep 28, 2005. Retrieved on Jan. 22, 2007
  2. ^
  3. ^ "Shooting suspect’s hostage: I gave him meth", The Associated Press, Sept 27, 2005. Retrieved on Jan. 22, 2007
  4. ^ {{{author}}}, Corey Coggins convicted of killing Daniel "Mack" Smith, [[{{{publisher}}}]], Mar 23, 2006. Retrieved on Apr. 5, 2007

[edit] External links

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