About Byron Smith
Byron Smith moved back to his family home in Little Falls, Minnesota to care for his elderly mother and enjoy a quiet retirement from the US State Department. On Thanksgiving Day 2012 Byron shot and killed two teens who broke into his home by breaking a bedroom window. It was the sixth burglary in six months. Previous burglaries included over $50,000 in gold, cash, jewelry, military medals, GPS units, video cameras, and critically important, three of his guns. Do people who steal guns use guns? Would you bet your life on it?
He feared for his life as each burglary became more violent and the fear that he would be killed by his own guns intensified. With his training in security, he installed cameras, recorders, locked and dead-bolted every door and window to his home to prevent entry. Prescription drug bottles were found in the teens' car from another home they had broken into the night before.
At the trial, they only depicted the prosecutions point of view, which amputated all five previous attacks in an attempt to make the attackers look harmless and the victim look irrational.
Byron - in front of vinyl records
The Smith Family Residence
The prosecutions tale pulled off an entire reversal of facts. They changed the attackers who broke in four times into "victims." Likewise they changed the innocent victim of five previous attacks into an "attacker."
No vigilante ever sat at home hoping that he would not be attacked. No ambusher ever waited in the most obvious place - in his own home. No"hunting blind" was ever fully open, both top to bottom and side to side, on the approach side. One should wonder, who is more foolish, prosecutor Orput for telling these lies, or the media for believing them.
Byron was convicted of first-degree murder in April of 2014 after an unusual trial and sentenced to life in prison. Before the trial, he lives with his neighbors, John and Kathy Lange and their 15-year old son, Dilan. The Imprisoned By Fear story is an intimate insight into this family’s friendship and support of Byron while this incident became national news. A Dateline episode, 12 Minutes on Elm Street, aired in May of 2014 only depicted a small portion of the real story. Kathy Lange’s book reveals facts that were not allowed in the trial and how the ripple effect of our nation’s drug epidemic caused a decorated US veteran to be imprisoned by his own fear.