Gavin Smith (film studio executive): Difference between revisions
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When Smith did not show up the next morning to pick up his son, or at work, both his family and coworkers reported him missing. Among the personal belongings that he did take with him when he left the Oak Park house were his cell phone and credit cards. Neither has been used since his disappearance. They could not identify anyone who might have had a reason to harm him, but believe that his fate or whereabouts are known. "We know someone knows something. There's no doubt that someone knows something," Smith's wife said. They believe his clothing and general appearance would not go unnoticed or unremembered.<ref name="ABC news story" /> |
When Smith did not show up the next morning to pick up his son, or at work, both his family and coworkers reported him missing. Among the personal belongings that he did take with him when he left the Oak Park house were his cell phone and credit cards. Neither has been used since his disappearance. They could not identify anyone who might have had a reason to harm him, but believe that his fate or whereabouts are known. "We know someone knows something. There's no doubt that someone knows something," Smith's wife said. They believe his clothing and general appearance would not go unnoticed or unremembered.<ref name="ABC news story" /> |
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The [[Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department]] (LACSD) is leading the investigation. They have suggested that they have [[ping]]s from his cell phone after 10 p.m. the night he disappeared, although they have not made the specifics public. "He was bouncing around the Valley or, at least, his phone was," said LACSD Sgt. John O'Brien. "We are talking about after bars close."<ref name="Daily Beast story" /> On May 8, a male body was found in the [[Angeles National Forest]] near the [[Angeles Crest Highway]] above [[La Cañada Flintridge, California|La Cañada Flintridge]]. It was not Smith's.<ref name="Hollywood Reporter body find" /> |
The [[Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department]] (LACSD) is leading the investigation. They have suggested that they have [[Ping (networking utility)|ping]]s from his cell phone after 10 p.m. the night he disappeared, although they have not made the specifics public. "He was bouncing around the Valley or, at least, his phone was," said LACSD Sgt. John O'Brien. "We are talking about after bars close."<ref name="Daily Beast story" /> On May 8, a male body was found in the [[Angeles National Forest]] near the [[Angeles Crest Highway]] above [[La Cañada Flintridge, California|La Cañada Flintridge]]. It was not Smith's.<ref name="Hollywood Reporter body find" /> |
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The Smiths and their friends have been looking in ravines in the area or other places where his car might have gone off the road, without success.<ref name="ABC news story" /> A volunteer search of remote areas planned for the weekend of May 19–20 has been called off due to the lack of "a specific area of defined interest" to search in. Flyers have been distributed and the LACSD has a special hotline number which, it says, has received "lots of tips".<ref name="LAT blog post" /><ref name="Hollywood reporter search calloff story">{{cite news|last=Couch|first=Aaron|title=Gavin Smith Family Calls Off Weekend Search for Missing Fox Executive|url=http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/gavin-smith-missing-fox-executive--325748|newspaper=The Hollywood Reporter|date=May 16, 2012|accessdate=May 17, 2012}}</ref> The family has put up a blog dedicated to the search and is offering a $20,000 reward.<ref name="family blog">{{cite web|title=Find Gavin Smith|url=http://findgavinsmith.com/|publisher=[[wordpress.com]]|date=May 16, 2012|accessdate=May 17, 2012}}</ref> Evan Smith has been using his [[Twitter]] feed to spread the word on the search as well.<ref name="LA Weekly story" /> |
The Smiths and their friends have been looking in ravines in the area or other places where his car might have gone off the road, without success.<ref name="ABC news story" /> A volunteer search of remote areas planned for the weekend of May 19–20 has been called off due to the lack of "a specific area of defined interest" to search in. Flyers have been distributed and the LACSD has a special hotline number which, it says, has received "lots of tips".<ref name="LAT blog post" /><ref name="Hollywood reporter search calloff story">{{cite news|last=Couch|first=Aaron|title=Gavin Smith Family Calls Off Weekend Search for Missing Fox Executive|url=http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/gavin-smith-missing-fox-executive--325748|newspaper=The Hollywood Reporter|date=May 16, 2012|accessdate=May 17, 2012}}</ref> The family has put up a blog dedicated to the search and is offering a $20,000 reward.<ref name="family blog">{{cite web|title=Find Gavin Smith|url=http://findgavinsmith.com/|publisher=[[wordpress.com]]|date=May 16, 2012|accessdate=May 17, 2012}}</ref> Evan Smith has been using his [[Twitter]] feed to spread the word on the search as well.<ref name="LA Weekly story" /> |
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Revision as of 22:30, 3 July 2012
Gavin Smith | |
|---|---|
 Picture distributed by LA County Sheriff's Department to help find Smith | |
| Born | 1955 |
| Disappeared | May 1, 2012 (age 57) Oak Park, California |
| Status | Missing for 12 years, 3 months and 12 days |
| Nationality | USA |
| Alma mater | UCLA, Hawaii |
| Occupation | Executive at 20th Century Fox |
| Known for | Member of 1975 NCAA champion men's basketball team; single-season scoring record at Hawaii |
Gavin Smith (born 1955 — disappeared May 1, 2012) is an executive in charge of distribution for 20th Century Fox. Prior to his 18 years in that position he played basketball at UCLA, where he was part of the 1975 team that won that year's NCAA championship, the last for legendary coach John Wooden.[1] He later played at Hawaii, where he set the school's still-standing single-season scoring record of 23.4 points per game.[2] He had a small role as a bartender in Cobb, the 1994 biopic of baseball legend Ty Cobb.
On the night of May 1, 2012, Smith left a friend's house in Oak Park, California, where he had been staying due to reported marital difficulties. It does not appear as if he had planned to be away for an extended period. When he failed to pick up one of his sons for school the next morning, his family reported him missing. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department is investigating.[3]
Life
A native of the San Fernando Valley, the 6-foot-6-inch (200 cm) Smith was a star player on the Van Nuys High School boys' basketball team in the early 1970s. He went on to attend the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and play there for coach John Wooden. In his sophomore year he was a forward on the 1975 team which won that year's NCAA championship, Wooden's tenth and last.[4]
He did not play in UCLA's 92–85 title-game defeat of Kentucky. The next season was his best at UCLA, as he appeared in all but two games, averaging 5.9 points per game (ppg). In the 1976 Final Four, he appeared twice. Against Indiana, the eventual champs, he scored six points, adding eight points and four rebounds in the third-place game victory over Rutgers. After the season, he transferred to Hawaii for a season and finished his playing career there,[4] setting the school's single-season scoring record of 23.4 ppg, a mark that still stands despite the subsequent introduction of the three-point field goal.[2]
At Hawaii, he was known for complementing his then long hair with a bandanna and bringing his dog to practice. Former Rainbow Warriors coach Riley Wallace, who coached against Smith at that time, remembers him as a formidable opponent. "He frustrated me as a coach," Wallace recalls. "He could score from anywhere on the floor ... [he was] probably one of the best shooters in the history of Hawaii."[2]
Eventually he began a career in the film industry, at first in front of the camera. He made his acting debut playing a bodyguard in a televised adaptation of Elmore Leonard's Glitz. The following year, he had a small role in Greg Mottola's debut short, "Swingin' in the Painter's Room."
After playing a bartender in the 1994 film Cobb, a biopic of baseball Hall of Famer Ty Cobb, he went into the business side of the industry as an executive. He took a job in 20th Century Fox's distribution department, making sure that films got to the theaters they were scheduled to appear in.[4] While he was not involved with the creative aspect of the business, he has been credited with helping films such as Titanic, Avatar and the rereleases of the original Star Wars trilogy succeed.[5]
By 2012 he was Fox's regional branch manager for theaters in the Dallas and Oklahoma City areas, working out of the company's Calabasas offices.[6] He had settled in the West Hills area of the Valley with his wife, Lisa, and three sons. One, Evan, had followed in his father's athletic footsteps, playing basketball for UCLA's crosstown rival, the University of Southern California.[4] According to friends, he had talked about returning to acting when he retired from Fox, as he expected to do in a few years.[7]
In the meantime, his success was offset by marital and financial difficulties. Smith's friends say that the former had been ongoing for several years, after Lisa Smith had become devoutly religious. In turn, Gavin, they say, consoled himself with occasional extramarital affairs. "I know he wanted to reconcile and fix things with his wife," a high school classmate, Gordon Van Tassell, said after his disappearance. "It was a couple [of affairs] and it was only out of the darkest frustration. Maybe just looking for relief or tenderness or something. It wasn't like he was a sex machine."[7]
The Smiths were also trying to sell their house. They had bought it when the market was booming and prices were high. As a result of the Great Recession, its market value had dropped to less than the money they still owed on the mortgage, leaving them upside down. While Gavin's job at Fox was secure, Lisa did not work. Like many other homeowners in that situation, they were trying to sell the house.[7]
Disappearance
Smith attended CinemaCon, the annual convention of the National Association of Theatre Owners in Las Vegas. Upon his return to the Los Angeles area, he went not to his West Hills home but that of a female colleague[7] and family friend on Kellwood Court[8] in nearby Oak Park. The Smith family says the overnight stay at Gavin's friend's home was planned, despite recent marital difficulties that had led Evan Smith to criticize his father for "leaving the family" in a tweet (since deleted) two weeks earlier. He reportedly stopped speaking to Gavin as well.[7] Evan later denied his parents were separating, saying "they were just going through normal stuff couples go through."[6]
Lisa Smith, who had been busy attending to her ill mother, says she spoke with him during the day to arrange for him to pick up one of their other sons for school on the morning of May 2. According to the friend, the two were up watching television until sometime after 9 p.m. When the friend went to bed, Smith told him he would be following shortly. Instead, around 10 p.m., he apparently got into his his black 2000 Mercedes-Benz 500E with California license plate 6EKT044 and left.[5] One report claims that someone else on the street actually saw the car leave.[8] No one has reported seeing him, or the car, since then.[5]
The Smiths say it was unlike Gavin to leave the house in the late evening without plans to do so or at least giving notice if the trip was unplanned. Their family friend reported that when he last saw Smith he was wearing purple workout pants that he had borrowed from Evan, with the intent of wearing them to bed.[8] This choice of clothing, they believe, makes it unlikely that his sudden departure was expected, or that he was going anywhere where he expected to be seen. Further, he left his cellphone charger, a shaving kit and other personal belongings at the Oak Park house, so it is likely that he expected to return.[5]
Investigation
When Smith did not show up the next morning to pick up his son, or at work, both his family and coworkers reported him missing. Among the personal belongings that he did take with him when he left the Oak Park house were his cell phone and credit cards. Neither has been used since his disappearance. They could not identify anyone who might have had a reason to harm him, but believe that his fate or whereabouts are known. "We know someone knows something. There's no doubt that someone knows something," Smith's wife said. They believe his clothing and general appearance would not go unnoticed or unremembered.[5]
The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LACSD) is leading the investigation. They have suggested that they have pings from his cell phone after 10 p.m. the night he disappeared, although they have not made the specifics public. "He was bouncing around the Valley or, at least, his phone was," said LACSD Sgt. John O'Brien. "We are talking about after bars close."[7] On May 8, a male body was found in the Angeles National Forest near the Angeles Crest Highway above La Cañada Flintridge. It was not Smith's.[4]
The Smiths and their friends have been looking in ravines in the area or other places where his car might have gone off the road, without success.[5] A volunteer search of remote areas planned for the weekend of May 19–20 has been called off due to the lack of "a specific area of defined interest" to search in. Flyers have been distributed and the LACSD has a special hotline number which, it says, has received "lots of tips".[3][9] The family has put up a blog dedicated to the search and is offering a $20,000 reward.[10] Evan Smith has been using his Twitter feed to spread the word on the search as well.[8]
A possible sighting of Smith subsequent to the disappearance was reported at the end of the month. David Brill of Madison, Wisconsin, who had been traveling to Southern California on business around the time Smith disappeared, told a TV station in his hometown that he had seen Smith with a woman at a restaurant in Morro Bay on May 7. The next morning he read the story online and identified Smith as the man. The waitress who served the man also believed him to be Smith, and said that he paid in cash and told her that he and his companion would be staying in town for a couple of days and then continuing north up the Pacific coast. The restaurant claimed to have a security camera tape but would not release it to the media.[11]
On June 8, police, accompanied by a SWAT team, executed a search warrant at a Canoga Park home belonging to a couple identified as John and Chandrika Creech, in connection with the case. After five hours, they emerged with several boxes and a computer, and towed away a black Audi sport-utility vehicle. Although searches like this are unusual in a missing-persons case, and homicide detectives were reportedly among the investigators present, the LACSD emphasized that it was still a missing-persons case and no evidence of foul play had yet been discovered. A lawyer for the Creeches who spoke with reporters at the scene said it was the second search of the house in the past month but refused to comment further.[12] Later, it was reported that more than 20 search warrants had been issued so far and police had seized cellphones and other files from the Creech house.[13]
Two weeks later, more details about why the Creeches' house might have been searched were reported. E! said Smith had reportedly had an affair with Chandrika, whom he had met while in therapy. After it had started in 2008, she had broken it off at the request of her husband, with whom she allegedly maintained an open marriage, living as a de facto separated couple in the house. John Creech, a convicted drug dealer who was facing new charges at the time of the search, had reportedly had no contact with Smith other than a email exchange in 2008.[13]
See also
References
- ^ Norlander, Matt (May 7, 2012). "Gavin Smith, former UCLA player, father to current USC sophomore, is missing". CBS Sports. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ a b c Mizutani, Ron (May 10, 2012). "Former UH basketball star Gavin Smith missing". KHON-TV. Honolulu. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ a b "Mystery deepens in disappearance of Hollywood exec Gavin Smith". The Los Angeles Times. May 10, 2012. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ a b c d e Miller, Daniel (May 10, 2012). "Body Found in Angeles National Forest Is Not Missing 20th Century Fox Executive". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ a b c d e f Vega, Cecilia (May 8, 2012). "Missing Hollywood Exec Gavin Smith's Family Pleads for Help". ABC News. Retrieved May 16, 2012.
- ^ a b Miller, Daniel (May 11, 2012). "Gavin Smith Mystery: Details Emerge About the Fox Executive's Disappearance". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ a b c d e f Fernandez, Maria Elena (May 24, 2012). "The Personal Trials of Missing Fox Movie Executive Gavin Smith". The Daily Beast. Retrieved May 29, 2012.
{{cite news}}: Unknown parameter|coauthor=ignored (|author=suggested) (help) - ^ a b c d Romero, Dennis (May 8, 2012). "Gavin Smith, Missing Fox Executive, Gets Twitter Campaign From Son Evan, USC Basketball Player". LA Weekly. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ Couch, Aaron (May 16, 2012). "Gavin Smith Family Calls Off Weekend Search for Missing Fox Executive". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ "Find Gavin Smith". wordpress.com. May 16, 2012. Retrieved May 17, 2012.
- ^ Curry, Colleen (May 25, 2012). "Missing LA Exec Gavin Smith Possibly Spotted With Woman in Restaurant". ABC News. Retrieved May 29, 2012.
- ^ Leu, Melissa (June 10, 2012). "Home searched in hunt for missing movie executive". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved June 21, 2012.
{{cite news}}: Unknown parameter|coauthor=ignored (|author=suggested) (help) - ^ a b Machado, Baker (June 21, 2012). "Sources: Missing Fox Exec Gavin Smith Had Affair With Woman Whose House Was Searched by Police". E!Online. Retrieved June 21, 2012.
{{cite news}}: Unknown parameter|coauthor=ignored (|author=suggested) (help)
External links
- Gavin Smith at IMDb
- Find Gavin Smith website set up by family.