March 19th, 1976
Tucson, AZ- Her body was found on March 19, 1976, but Tucson police believed that Smith was probably killed five days earlier, on a Sunday. On that night, McCullough had been seen acting erratically in an empty lot near a food store. He was semiconscious and badly bloodied, apparently from self-inflicted slashes to his wrist. He told one responding police officer that he had cut himself “out in the field,” but another officer later recalled that McCullough said that he had “done it out in his bedroom.” Donna Marie Smith’s legs were protruding from a hallway bathroom. She was lying face down in a crusted pool of blood, the color more black than red. Her throat and right wrist had been slashed, and next to her crushed skull were three blood-covered bricks, according to a police report at the time. A suspect immediately emerged: Bruce Allen McCullough, who was living with Smith at the time of the murder.
