In the winter of 2010, a life was abruptly ended in a business parking lot in northeast Oklahoma City. On November 30th, 45-year-old Michael Wayne Smith, a Caucasian male, found himself in a heated argument. The disagreement escalated tragically, and the sharp report of gunfire cut through the air. Smith was struck, and though he was quickly transported by a private vehicle to Midwest City Hospital, his wounds proved fatal, and he was pronounced dead upon arrival. The person who fired the fatal shot vanished from the scene, leaving behind a mystery that has lingered for years. As of the latest reports, no arrests have ever been made in connection with the shooting, and the case remains an open and unsolved homicide. Law enforcement officials continue to seek information from the public, hoping for a lead that might finally bring closure to the family and friends of Michael Wayne Smith.
A different and entirely separate case involving a man with a similar name also unfolded in Oklahoma City, though its conclusion was starkly different. This case involved Michael Dewayne Smith, a man whose actions led to his own state-sanctioned death. In February 2002, Smith committed two separate murders on the same day. He first killed 41-year-old Janet Moore and later that day, he shot and killed 22-year-old Sharath Pulluru, a convenience store clerk. Prosecutors stated that Smith was a gang member who acted out of misguided revenge. He was apprehended, and for these crimes, he was convicted and sentenced to death.
For two decades, Michael Dewayne Smith resided on death row, his legal team filing numerous appeals that were ultimately unsuccessful. His attorneys argued that he was intellectually disabled and that his confession was coerced while he was under the influence of drugs. Despite these claims, and a final plea for clemency that was denied, the date for his execution was set. On April 4, 2024, forty-one-year-old Michael Dewayne Smith was put to death by lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. He was the first person to be executed in Oklahoma in that year. His case came to a definitive, and for the families of his victims, a just conclusion, though his own family continued to maintain his innocence and decry the inhumanity of the death penalty.
