Police Grilled Accuser in Smith Rape Case

In pressing her complaint that she was raped at the Kennedy estate here, the accuser of William Kennedy Smith was questioned repeatedly by police about aspects of her past that appear unrelated to the alleged incident.

At the same time, because of the prominence of the accused’s family, many details of the 29-year-old woman’s life, including her name, have been made public. She not only has been questioned by police and by private investigators hired by the defense team but also has been pursued by an unusually intense pack of reporters.

Smith, charged May 9 with felony sexual battery and misdemeanor battery in the incident, was arraigned here Friday and pleaded not guilty to both charges.

Details of the investigation into what happened at the estate in the pre-dawn hours of March 30, and of the woman’s life, have emerged from 1,300 pages of documents that were released by Palm Beach police.

The documents indicate that police followed up nearly every revelation and rumor in an extensive effort to nail down a criminal case based almost entirely on the woman’s account.

Investigators asked her during at least five separate interviews to describe her most personal thoughts and to admit illegal drug use, as well as to relive the alleged attack, which she said took place when Smith pulled her to the ground and assaulted her on the estate lawn. One interview by State Atty. David Bludworth, who presented the case against Smith, was described by investigators as so traumatic to the woman that it caused her hands and legs to shake and “she seemed about ready at several different times to break down in tears.”

The documents show that police have interrogated the woman on her mental health, finances, attitudes about sex and feelings about men generally.

As police delved into her background, the woman fled her home to escape journalists, only to find herself identified by name by a supermarket tabloid, NBC News and the New York Times.

“Despite what I have been through and what I know remains ahead, I feel I have made the right decision because rape needs to be reported in order to prevent others from going through this outrage,” the woman said through her lawyer the day Smith, 30, was charged.

Three days into the investigation, the documents show, Assistant State Prosecutor Moira Lasch asked the woman to provide names of physicians who had treated her in the past, all drugs prescribed, prior counselors and an explanation of why she had failed to pay an allergist’s fees nine years earlier.

When computers at two pharmacies produced long lists of her prescription drugs, including muscle relaxants, tranquilizers and pain pills, the woman was obliged to discuss an automobile accident in July, 1976, when she broke her lower back and had a spinal fusion. She has been described as having had chronic problems since then.