Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, January 28, 1995                   TAG: 9501310049
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: MIDDLETOWN                                 LENGTH: Medium

MOTHER ARRESTED IN DEATH OF GIRL WHO LIVED IN HOUSE OF HORRORS

The 12-year-old's emaciated, nude body was found Monday, and police charged the mother and a live-in boyfriend with first-degree murder Thursday.

Neighbors and officials described a house of horrors where four children never were sent to school and lived in abject squalor.

``I've never seen anything like it. It was like the pictures you see from Somalia or Auschwitz or something,'' said Lawrence Ambrogi, the Frederick County prosecutor.

Toys, furniture and trash were piled on the porch a day after county officials took the three remaining children away.

Valerie Smelser weighed just 51 pounds, about 20 pounds below normal weight for her age, when her body was discovered. Police say the child was abused or neglected before her death, but will not reveal the nature of the injuries.

An autopsy showed that Valerie died either from a blow to the head, hypothermia or a combination of the two.

The prosecutor said investigators believe the child died at the house and her body was driven to Clarke County where it was dumped in a wooded ravine near the Shenandoah River.

Wanda Smelser, 42, and Norman Hoverter, 49, told police the child wandered away or was abducted when the family stopped Sunday night to get gas along Interstate 81.

Neighbors said they were skeptical of the story.

``I never believed that for a minute,'' said Alice Mills, who runs a real estate office across the street from the Smelser home. ``I saw the way those people lived. Nobody worked, nobody took those kids to school. Come to think of it, I never even saw that woman bring a bag of groceries into that house.''

Smelser and her children moved into the rented house in October, but the children never were enrolled in Frederick County schools, officials said.

The children's father, Loyd Smelser of Front Royal, said he tried several times to report suspected abuse to social service agencies. But Wanda Smelser kept moving, renting rundown houses in a half-dozen jurisdictions in Virginia and West Virginia since separating from her husband two years ago.

Wanda Smelser is unemployed and told police she had no income or child support for Valerie; Brittany, 14; Benjamin, 7; and Nicholas,4.

Keywords:
FATALITY