Smith was last seen at 11:26 p.m. on September 2, 1998, after she completed her shift at Gulfport Memorial Hospital in the 4500 block of 13th Street in Gulfport, Mississippi. She worked as a floor clerk at the nurse's station. Smith called her mother from the hospital parking lot to check on her children. She got into her black four-door 1997 Mitsubishi Gallant with tinted windows and the Mississippi license plate number RBB-712 and drove away. A photograph of the car is posted below this case summary.

Smith planned to stop at the Sav-A-Center grocery store after work to purchase items from her grandfather, but there's no evidence that she ever went there that day. She never arrived at her home in Pass Christian, Mississippi and has never been heard from again. On October 29, nearly two months after she vanished, her car was found backed into a parking space at Southern Pines Apartments on St. Charles Street in Gulfport. No one nearby claimed to have seen Smith or known her. Some evidence was collected from the vehicle for possible DNA testing in the future.

Smith, a graduate of Pass Christian High School, left behind nine siblings and two young children. She is described as a devoted mother who wouldn't have abandoned her children. Her ex-boyfriend, Tim Bryant, is the father of both of her children, and they lived together. Smith broke up with him a few weeks before her disappearance, took their children and moved in with her mother and grandfather. Bryant is considered a person of interest in Smith's disappearance, but not a strong suspect. He now lives in Texas.

Authorities stated they had little evidence to implicate anyone in Smith's disappearance, but her case is classified as a possible homicide.

Above: Smith's Mitsubishi Gallant