4 Years Old Child Killer Eric Smith’s Release Is ‘Huge Gamble’, According To Prosecutor

Derrick Robie (4 years old) was lured into a stand full of trees by Eric Smith, who was just 13 at the time. Smith choked Robie after hitting him with rocks. Smith then poured Kool-Aid all over Robie. When the boy was dead, Smith raped him with a stick.

Eric Smith is now 42 years old. He is a single man living in Queens. He has a fiancée. Derrick Robie has a lot of old pictures and a lot of pain.

After serving 28 years in prison, Smith was finally released. Smith’s life has been forever changed, according to the parole board. He stated that he would like to live a normal life.

“I want to get married and raise a family,” Smith spoke to a television station in 2009. “Pursue the American dream.”

However, John Tunney, prosecutor of Smith’s case, has long said he fears Smith would kill again.

“It’s a huge gamble,” Tunney said that Tunney was speaking to CBS. “48 Hours” In a segment that is now being streamed live on Paramount + “This parole decision is a high-risk enterprise, to be sure.”

Smith’s release, according to Doreen Robie and Dale, is a new beginning after years of struggle to keep their son’s killer in prison.

“I understand why after so many years they decided to give him a chance. And that’s fine, you know for him and his family,” Derrick’s mother spoke out. “You know he’s been released, but in a way so have we. No more parole. I can get on with our lives. Now the true healing can begin.”

The Robies lived in the small town of Savona in northern New York in the summer of 1993. Derrick was a participant in a recreation program held in a park just a block away from his home. Doreen Robie was sidetracked by Derrick’s sibling in August, and the little boy said to her.

“It’s OK, Mom.  I’ll — I’ll go by myself. You know, it’s no problem. The kids are probably going down the street.”

Derrick ran, clutching his bag with the lunch that his mom had prepared for them. He was never seen by her again.

After a thunderstorm, Doreen ran down to get her kid but was told that he hadn’t arrived.

As per Insideedition, massive search groups later located his mangled body hiding in the trees. He appeared to have been staged, according to authorities. His shoes were taken. His lunch had been torn and the Kool-Aid his mother had brought for him had been poured into his wounds. Authorities said that he was sodomized with a stick and that heavy rocks were dropped on him.

“He could have simply killed Derrick, but he chose not to simply kill Derrick,” Tunney stated. “Eric continued to deal with Derrick’s body because he wanted to, because he chose to, and, most frighteningly, because he enjoyed it.”

After his son’s funeral, Smith admitted to the murder. He claimed he was in a state of rage and anger as a result of years of abuse because of his freckles and red hair, slow academic performance, and big ears.

“Eric was tired of being the victim in his mind,” Tunney stated to CBS News. “And he wanted to see what it felt like to be the victimizer.”

After being quietly freed from prison on parole in February, Smith relocated to Queens, New York. He expressed his disinterest in returning to Savona.

Tunney explained that it is a small community, and he was worried that Doreen would be shopping at the grocery store and turn around to see the man who killed her son standing behind her.

They are working to move on with their lives, according to Robies.

“August second, the day we lost him, we always try and go to do something fun. White ice cream with sprinkles. That’s what Derrick called vanilla, so we try to, “Dale Robie said that he was losing his composure.

“Wherever we are, we have to go find ice cream,” Doreen Robie.