# He Murdered His Entire Family To Steal Their $900,000 Inheritance
The deputies later described just how eerie it was to walk through that house. This was a hoarder’s house, filled with stacks upon stacks of accumulated belongings. But how did police even know something was wrong inside the home in the first place?
It all started when Richard Smith didn’t show up for work.
When he failed to appear for several days, his workmates became very concerned about him. Richard, John, and Vonal all had their throats slit and were covered in blood. Investigators would later hear talk that witchcraft was involved, and law enforcement officials openly came out and said that they believed the occult played a role in this horrific crime.
But was there one single thing that caused the killer to snap? The answer may lie in a specific clause in the mother’s will, one that excluded a family member entirely.
I’m Nancy Odell, and today’s crime expose takes us to Pensacola, Florida. A mother and her two sons were discovered viciously murdered in their own home. The prime suspect was a follower of the occult, and cops believed that witchcraft was involved in these brutal killings.
The Smith family lived their lives in quiet anonymity. Vonal Smith, the matriarch of the family, shared the home with two adult sons from her second marriage, Richard and John. The Smith family was very reclusive, living in an area surrounded by woods.
They didn’t interact with their neighbors very much, and very few people had ever actually been inside their home other than family members.
Vonal did not leave the house very often. She pretty much watched QVC all day and liked to order things online. One neighbor who lived nearby for nearly eight years admitted, “I’ve never seen that woman one time in my life.
I’ve never seen anybody but those two boys.”
Richard Smith worked for the Department of Homeland Security in Pensacola. He pretty much went to work, came home, and took care of his mother. Richard had a fairly high government job that was apparently very important to the federal government.
John Smith was described as being a little bit slow, and he worked at a Walmart in his mid-40s.
There was a third son, Donald, who lived nearby. Donald Hartung was a stepbrother to Richard and John Smith. He was from Vonal’s previous marriage, so he was a little bit older, and he lived a few miles from the current family home.
The family did seem to be a blended family that got along fairly well, at least for outward appearances. There didn’t seem to be any conflict there.
Every Tuesday, Donald Hartung came over to the Smith family home, and he would cook dinner for the family. It was a routine that seemed to bring everyone together, a weekly ritual of shared meals and familial connection. But appearances can be deceiving, and this seemingly harmonious arrangement was about to shatter in the most violent way imaginable.
One day, Richard Smith, dependable as the day was long, didn’t show up for work. When he didn’t show up for several days, his workmates became very concerned about it. It was unusual for him not to show up or not to call in.
His supervisor went out to the family home and ultimately called the police to come in and check on him.
The 911 call captured the growing concern. The supervisor explained, “One of my employees, who’s a very large man, has not shown up to work for 3 days. So I came out to his house and his car’s here.
Doors are all locked, windows, shades are all drawn. There’s a bunch of packages on the front step. And I would like someone to be here when I break a window to get in there to check on.”
When law enforcement and the coworker arrived at the Smith home, the Smiths’ cars were there. Once law enforcement was able to gain entry into the Smith home, they realized that this house was a hoarder’s house. There were boxes everywhere.
The deputies talked about just how eerie it was to walk into this very quiet house with all these stacks and stacks of stuff.
As they moved through the house, there was an odor, and they were trying to figure out where it was coming from. There were piles of clothes everywhere. As they started to pull back the clothing, the odor got stronger, and then they found the bodies.
They located Vonal Smith, deceased, in John’s bedroom under a pile of clothes. They located Richard Smith, deceased, in the den on the floor. And they located brother John Smith, deceased, on a couch in that den, also under some clothes.
The manner of death for the Smith family was quite violent. Richard was covered in blood. It looked like he had a bullet wound to the side of his head.
John was seated on a couch in the den, and the top of his head was bashed in. Richard, John, and Vonal all had their throats slit and were covered in blood.
In addition to the blunt force trauma, Vonal had an additional injury that was strange. She was missing part of her pinky finger. Police were stunned by the absolute carnage inflicted upon the family.
There were signs that the victims knew their attacker. There were no broken windows, no broken locks, no doors kicked in. It did look personal.
It also showed that the victims knew who was approaching them because it seemed to be at very close quarters that they were killed. This indicated there was some relationship between the victims and the murderer.
It appeared that this was some sort of emotional rage, something personal, and that the person who had done this to them had a lot of hatred. While the police were on scene searching the residence, they located a hammer in the kitchen. They took that hammer to the autopsy to compare it to the wounds on the bodies, and it appeared to be one of the weapons used in the murders.
The Escambia Sheriff’s Department began their investigation with those closest to the family. Donald Hartung was the first person they visited to inform him of the murders, and police say his reaction was unusual. He did not seem shocked or surprised.
When told his family was dead, Donald’s response was flat and emotionless. He asked how they were killed, and when told they were deceased and it looked like they were killed, he simply repeated, “Killed. Mhm.”
Typically, when a family member is notified of their entire family being killed, you elicit some kind of emotion, some kind of reaction. When Mr. Hartung did not have any of those, investigators found that to be very strange and concerning.
When police commented to Donald that his lack of emotion seemed strange, he kept saying, “I am emotional.” But he didn’t show any emotion. When told it looked like they were shot, Donald responded, “It’s hard to tell because there was a lot of clothes on top of them.”
His knowledge of the details was curious, to say the least.
Donald Hartung indicated to the police that he last saw his family on Tuesday when he came by to make the family dinner. When he left, everything was as it should be. The family had eaten dinner, and he had even left a plate for Richard when he got home from work.
Police inspected Donald’s home looking for anything that suggested he was involved in the murders. What they found sent a chill through all of them. When law enforcement walked around Donald Hartung’s home, they noticed a room full of books about the Wiccan religion.
There were some shrines, a Ouija board, and just some interesting artifacts related to his Wiccan faith.
If they weren’t weirded out by going to the crime scene, when they went to Donald’s home, that put them on overdrive. They were very much in the deep south there, in the Bible belt. The idea of witchcraft shocked a lot of people.
Donald’s allegiance to Wicca was peculiar, but not a reason to connect him to the murder, at least not yet. But days later, the sheriff’s department revealed that an unnamed suspect’s interest in the occult may have led to the killings. When the sheriff finally was able to do a press conference, he talked about the murders being ritualistic.
He mentioned that it was a blue moon, which is when you have two full moons in a month. He felt like witchcraft was involved, and he openly came out and said that. When the media started reporting on it, they reported on the killer being the Blue Moon Killer, trying to build off of that story and grab attention to it.
Investigators also considered the possibility that Richard Smith’s job in Homeland Security could have made him a target. Richard’s job at the Department of Homeland Security was investigated. There were some members of the Department of Homeland Security who looked into whether this could have been something that had anything to do with his job.
Was he the real target, with the other two just collateral damage?
All of that was bubbling around definitely on the federal side. Richard Smith’s job and the Wicca link both turned out to be unrelated to the crime. Detectives looked for other possible motives for the triple homicide and found none.
But they did learn of tensions in the Smith family that may have led to murder.
The Escambia County Sheriff’s had a triple homicide on their hands, and with no clear evidence pointing to the killer’s identity, the further they dug into the Smith family history, the more they saw anger festering below the surface. They say the Smith family was anything but blended.
Donald Hartung made mention to other family members that he was kind of like the black sheep of the family. He felt that his mom favored her two sons, Richard and John, and didn’t treat him as well as she treated the other two. Donald had a little bit of a criminal past.
He had a drinking problem and did have some DUIs. He was a little bit more sociable than the rest of the family, but still just about as odd as the others.
But it was statements that Donald had made to coworkers that really got the attention of investigators. As law enforcement started to talk to the people that knew Donald, there were conversations about how he was going to inherit a lot of money. Apparently, Vonal did have money, and he was going to be the one who was going to get it.
Mr. Hartung made statements to one of his coworkers regarding the fact that he may inherit money if something were to happen to his family. Investigators also found out that he was excluded from his mother’s will.
Vonal had left a will and testament. She left all of her belongings, financial and otherwise, to her sons, Richard and John. And she specifically provided a clause in the will that Donald Hartung was to be excluded.
There was about $900,000 involved in this. There also was money in the house. They found a safe with a significant amount of cash in it.
The family wasn’t wealthy, but they were well off.
Donald Hartung was working as a security officer at a local hospital. And three weeks after the Smith family was found murdered in their home, Donald Hartung submitted his letter of resignation. Meanwhile, forensic investigators had meticulously gone over the crime scene looking for evidence that they could tie to a suspect, and they found it.
At that point, the case had moved past circumstantial. When they looked at the DNA and did their full sweep of the crime scene, they found cigarette butts in a trash can that had bloody rags that had been used to clean up the crime scene. The cigarettes had Donald’s DNA on them.
They also found Donald’s DNA on Richard’s belt, which seemed to be unusual. It was honing in more and more that Donald was the killer.
From the beginning, it appeared as though Mr. Hartung felt like he would get away with this murder, that he had everything thought out and he would inherit the money. Police now knew that Donald Hartung was the killer.
They had incriminating statements, DNA evidence, and a strong motive that linked him to the triple homicide.
Donald Hartung was arrested and indicted for three counts of first-degree murder. After his arrest, he was held in the Escambia County Jail on no bond, pending trial. Donald was arrested and not given any bond.
He pleaded innocent right away and got a very good defense attorney.
While Donald was in jail waiting trial, he was feared. People saw him as a warlock or witch, and they stayed away from him. He did have a cellmate that he bonded with somewhat.
And police say Donald’s inability to keep his mouth shut would strengthen the prosecution’s case even more and seal his fate.
Donald Hartung was charged with the triple homicides of his mother and two stepbrothers. He was held without bond and jailed on an open charge of murder. He was facing the death penalty if a jury found him guilty.
And as fate would have it, while awaiting trial, Donald met a kindred spirit. It was a friendship that would come back to haunt him.
While Donald Hartung was in custody in the jail, he had a cellmate that reached out to the state attorney’s office in an effort to provide information that he had gotten from Donald Hartung while they were incarcerated together. The cellmate shared details about the homicide scene. It stuck out to prosecutor Mr.
Puroy because he thought it was pretty cold that someone would 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 their own mother.
According to the cellmate, Donald Hartung acknowledged that he did in fact murder his family. He did acknowledge that it was for financial gain. And he also told the cellmate that he had cut his mother’s pinky in an effort to torture her to get a safe combination.
Donald shared that this was about money, this was about a will. If he was able to 𝓀𝒾𝓁𝓁 all of his siblings and his mom, he would be the one who would inherit all that money that she had.
The cellmate and Donald Hartung had bonded over the fact that the cellmate claimed to be interested in the Wiccan religion and learning about it. That led Donald to believe that he could trust this cellmate. The cellmate recalled Donald saying he killed his family because he wanted the money since she left him out of the will.
When asked if the murders were something that just kind of happened or something he had been thinking about, Donald said he’d been planning it for like three to four years. He said the Ouija board made him go overboard. The cellmate’s testimony of jailhouse conversations with the defendant was another brick in the prosecution’s case against Donald Hartung.
The testimony of Donald Hartung’s cellmate was a pivotal point in the trial as it gave insight to facts and evidence that would not have been public. They could have only come from Mr. Hartung himself.
Donald Hartung’s sensational murder trial was widely covered by the media. The public was fascinated with the lurid details of the crime, from Donald’s obsession with the occult to his murderous rage. There was a very strong case, but you never really know how the jury is going to take it.
If they can get just a little bit of doubt in their mind, they’re supposed to find him not guilty.
The jury deliberated and came back with a verdict of guilty as charged for all three counts of first-degree premeditated murder. They gave him three life sentences. Donald Hartung had narrowly avoided death in the heinous murders of his family, but investigators say his greed was his undoing, and he’ll never see the light of day outside a prison cell.
The triple murders of Vonal, Richard, and John Smith shocked Pensacola with the killer’s connection to the occult. In the end, witchcraft had little to do with the killings. Donald Hartung’s greed and anger had finally boiled over, resulting in the slaughter.
He will spend the rest of his life behind bars trying to figure out how his plan went so wrong.
And now it’s time for today’s safety spotlight. The Slayer statute is a law preventing a murderer from inheriting money or property from their victim. And while this law may be enough to discourage some individuals, taking additional precautions can help maximize your financial and physical safety.
For example, consult with an estate planning attorney to establish or change beneficiaries in your will in the event of a divorce, death, or changes in family dynamics. If a family member or spouse is pressuring you regarding a will, if your relationship with them is contentious, or if you fear for your safety, inform your attorney who can advise you on the best way to safeguard yourself and your family.
I’m Nancy Odell. For all of us here at Crime Expose, please join us next time and stay safe.
