In October 1994, Susan Smith called South Carolina police claiming her two sons, 3-year-old Michael and 14-month-old Alex, were kidnapped when a Black man stole her car.
However, after a nine-day search, Susan confessed she was responsible for the deaths of her two boys. According to NBC News, she told investigators she had strapped Michael and Alex into their car seats, before pushing her Mazda into a nearby lake with the kids still inside of it.
Susan was convicted of Michael and Alex's murders in 1995 and sentenced to life in prison.
She was subsequently taken to the Camille Griffin Graham Correctional Institution and later the Leath Correctional Institution, where she met Afred Rowe, who was one of the two prison guards she had an "inappropriate" relationship with.
In the upcoming Lifetime series Cellmate Secrets: Susan Smith, Alfred and his wife Elizabeth Rowe discuss how their lives were "turned upside down" by his affair with Susan, who is described as "manipulative."
Alfred confessed to having a sexual relationship with Susan in 2003. Following his admission, the prison guard was sentenced to five years probation.
Additionally, Susan's former prison cellmates Stephanie Hulsey and Christie Smith discuss the time they served alongside the now-49-year-old inmate. They tell Lifetime they were manipulated into helping Susan carry out sexual affairs with other individuals, and describe how she coerced others into getting her drugs.
According to NBC News, Susan wrote a letter to The State reporter Harrison Cahill in 2015, in which she said, "I am not the monster society thinks I am."
As Susan told Harrison, she was not in her "right mind" when she killed her two sons, writing, "There was no motive as it was not even a planned event."
Furthermore, she stated that contrary to prior reports, she did not kill her two boys so she could be with a man, whom told her he didn't want any children. She said, "The thing that hurts me the most is that people think I hurt my children in order to be with a man... That is so far from the truth."
Learn more about Susan's life behind bars when Cellmate Secrets: Susan Smith premieres on Lifetime next Friday, July 9 at 10 p.m.