PORTLAND — A 26-year-old woman said to be taking medication for schizophrenia pleaded guilty Wednesday to trying to kill her aunt and uncle on the Warm Springs Indian Reservation.
Rhyan Leigh Smith said “guilty” when asked in federal court how she pleaded to two counts of assault with the intent to commit murder and one count of possession of a firearm in the furtherance of a crime of violence in the 2016 shootings.
Smith will face at least a 10-year prison sentence because the gun conviction brings a mandatory minimum sentence of a decade behind bars. Her sentencing is set for May 21.
U.S. District Judge Michael W. Mosman in October 2016 found Smith mentally incompetent to aid in her own defense in October 2016. Since then, Smith has received treatment in a federal medical facility in Texas and has undergone psychological evaluation, her defense lawyer said.
An evaluation last November found she didn’t suffer from a mental disease or defect, but another doctor’s evaluation in December said she was psychotic and experienced hallucinations from schizophrenia at the time of the offense.
At her defense lawyer’s advice, Smith reached a plea agreement with prosecutors.
Assistant federal public defender Ruben Iniguez told Mosman that he believed Smith, while on her medication for schizophrenia, was fully competent to offer her plea and understood the court proceedings.
The shooting occurred on the morning of March 16, 2016. Warm Springs police received a 911 call at 8:24 a.m. from Smith’s father, who reported that his daughter had shot two people in their home. Smith was found lying on the ground, about 100 yards from the home, with an AR-15 rifle beside her, according to FBI agents.
Witnesses told investigators that Smith knocked on the bedroom door where her uncle and aunt slept. Her uncle, Zack Chambers, said he talked with Smith for about 30 seconds. Smith asked him about “the kids at the Warm Springs K-8 school and the news that some of them were cutting themselves,” according to a criminal complaint.
Chambers told Smith that he was going to bed and started to shut the door. As he turned away, he heard a shot. Smith shot him multiple times and then fired at her aunt, Bernadette Smith, when she emerged from the bathroom off the bedroom upon hearing the shots, according to the complaint.
Chambers was shot five times, and his wife also was hit multiple times. FBI agents recovered at least seven 9mm bullet casings on the floor. Rhyan Smith had obtained the handgun from someone else without permission, according to the FBI.
At the time, Rhyan Smith’s father said his daughter and her aunt didn’t get along and often argued, the complaint said.
Rhyan Smith’s lawyer will seek a 12-year sentence for Smith. Prosecutors will seek the minimum 10-year sentence for the firearm conviction, plus a consecutive sentence for the two attempted murder convictions that ranges from six and a half years to eight years, according to the plea deal.
Smith is being held at the Multnomah County Inverness Jail.
