Carol Lynne Ashcom, a 30-year-old White/Caucasian female, was killed on March 11, 2015, inside her home on Virginia Avenue in Lower Yoder Township, near Johnstown, Pennsylvania. Police were called to the home shortly after 11 a.m. after she was found by her child's father, who had gone there to visit before a planned trip to Florida. Her young son was inside the home when she was discovered.
An autopsy determined that Carol died from multiple gunshot wounds to the upper torso, and her death was ruled a homicide.
At first, the killing appeared to be a sudden act of violence inside a quiet residential home, but investigators later connected Carol's death to a larger drug investigation. Carol had been working as a confidential informant with the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney General and had made controlled drug purchases from Shakir Mosi Smith several times in April 2014. Those buys helped lead to Smith's arrest on drug charges, and he was placed in Cambria County Prison in June 2014.
Authorities said that while Smith was incarcerated, he learned Carol's identity as an informant and blamed her for his arrest. Prosecutors alleged that from behind bars, Smith arranged for her to be killed. Investigators reviewed prison communications, including letters Smith sent to India Snyder, and the case also included wiretap evidence from prison visits. According to court records, those letters ordered Carol's death and also included threats toward Snyder. Prosecutors described Smith as a figure connected to a Johnstown-area drug organization and argued that Carol was targeted because she had cooperated with law enforcement.
Smith was eventually charged in connection with Carol's killing, not as the person accused of personally firing the shots, but as the man who solicited and helped bring about the murder. At trial, Snyder testified that Smith had ordered Carol's death. Four of Smith's former cellmates also testified that he said he had ordered the killing. Smith took the stand in his own defense and denied giving anyone instructions to kill Carol, arguing that his letters and conversations did not amount to a murder order.
The jury did not accept Smith's denial. On September 30, 2020, after a trial in Cambria County, he was found guilty of solicitation to commit murder and first-degree murder as an accomplice. Court officials said the jury reached its verdict in less than an hour. On October 22, 2020, Smith was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for first-degree murder as an accomplice, along with a concurrent sentence of 20 to 40 years for criminal solicitation of murder.
Smith later appealed, challenging pretrial rulings, the admission of evidence, the wiretap, and the sufficiency and weight of the evidence. In November 2021, the Superior Court of Pennsylvania affirmed his judgment of sentence, leaving the conviction and life sentence in place. Publicly available reporting and court records identify Smith as the person convicted of ordering Carol's killing, but they do not identify a convicted shooter.
