Gavin Smith (film studio executive)

In January 2015, John Lenzie Creech, a convicted drug dealer who had begun an eight-year prison sentence on that charge shortly after Smith disappeared, was arrested again and charged with the murder. His wife, Chandrika Cade-Creech, had reportedly been romantically involved with Smith. Creech's attorney said the death was a "tragic accident". According to testimony before the grand jury that indicted Creech on the murder charge, he allegedly beat Smith to death after catching him and his wife together. Creech was convicted of voluntary manslaughter on July 3, 2017.

Two months after the July 2017 verdict, the judge sentenced Creech to the maximum sentence allowed by law: 11 years incarcerated.

In January 2015, three months after Smith's remains were discovered, Creech, two years into an eight-year sentence, was arrested and charged with his murder. The arraignment was postponed for a month. Creech's attorney called Smith's death a "tragic accident", saying his client was innocent of the murder charge. "There may have been a fight, but I can tell you there was no criminal intent," said Alex Kessel.

In May 2014, two years after Smith was last seen, law enforcement officials declared Smith dead and a judge issued a death certificate. His date of death was declared to have been the night he disappeared. "I think the idea of a person that goes missing out of nowhere is intriguing and tragic," said a spokesman for the LACSD.

On October 26, 2014, Smith's remains were found in Palmdale, California. A hiker's dog found a shallow grave containing a skull, some bones, and clothing in a rural area between Palmdale and Acton just outside the Angeles National Forest. Authorities announced the body's discovery 11 days later, after it had been positively identified as Smith.

On January 23, 2013, a vehicle seized at an unrelated Granada Hills drug bust turned out to belong to Creech. It led investigators to Smith's missing Mercedes, found a month later at a Simi Valley storage facility, also connected with Creech, whom police continued to describe as a person of interest. Blood and body tissue, including skin stuck to the car seat, was found inside, later identified as belonging to Smith.

In March 2013, a sheriff's statement said detectives were now investigating the case as a homicide, although Smith's body had not been found. Officials also revealed that they believed they had identified the motive in the alleged crime. However, citing the ongoing investigation, they declined to elaborate on the possible motive or any other details of the case.

At a press conference held the day the body's discovery was announced, investigators shared more information. Their theory was that Smith was killed in his car shortly after he disappeared. Based on that evidence, they had "confidently labeled Smith's death a homicide" after finding the car in 2013. They believed the death would prove to be the result of blunt force trauma; although they could not yet rule out gunshot wounds they did not believe that there would be any.

On the night of May 1, 2012, Smith left a friend's house in Oak Park, where he had been staying due to reported marital difficulties. It does not appear he planned to be away long. When he failed to pick up one of his sons for school the next morning, his family reported him missing. Two years later, with Smith still missing and no evidence of his presence anywhere past the night of his disappearance, he was retroactively declared legally dead. Several months later, on October 26, 2014, hikers chanced upon Smith's remains near Palmdale in the Antelope Valley.

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. According to friends, he had talked about returning to acting when he retired from Fox as he expected to within a few years.

Since the search of the Creeches, the LACSD had not made any more public moves related to the case. John Creech pleaded guilty to the drug charges and was sentenced to eight years in prison in September 2012. America's Most Wanted did a segment on the case in October.

Confronted by his wife, Smith initially broke off the affair with Creech. In 2010 however, Smith and Creech resumed their relationship and had begun exchanging romantic messages. Smith's wife discovered the messages and, in an impulsive decision, drove her two sons to Creech’s home where they told John Creech of the affair. He initially indicated his intent to kill their father, but later relented, telling the sons, "... you just saved your father's life by coming here today." In 2012, when the romance rekindled yet again, Creech allegedly made good on his threat, stalking Chandrika Creech using a cell phone GPS tracking application to follow her to the point of the rendezvous. Creech then allegedly pummeled Smith to his death, temporarily ditched his car and body at an accomplice's garage near Porter Ranch after the killing, and returned later to retrieve the body and tow Smith's car to a secluded, clandestine location.

In the meantime, his success was offset by marital, financial and substance abuse difficulties. He spent time in drug rehab. Regarding the Smiths' financial problems, they had bought their house when the market was booming and prices were high. "Upside-down" as a result of the Panic of 2008, the market value of his home plunged to less than the balance owed on the mortgage, leaving him under significant pressure, steeped in a negative equity position. They were trying to sell the house.

Two weeks later, more details about why the Creeches' house might have been searched were reported. Los Angeles County Sheriff's Lt. Dave Dolson said Smith met Chandrika Creech while they were both in drug rehab, and that they were in a romantic relationship. After it had started in 2008, she had broken it off at the request of her husband John Creech, a convicted drug dealer who was facing new charges at the time of the search, and had reportedly had no contact with Smith other than an email exchange in 2008.

According to the friend Smith was staying with, the two were up watching television until sometime after 9 p.m. When the friend went to bed, Smith told her he would be following shortly. Instead, around 10 p.m., he apparently got into his black 2000 Mercedes-Benz E420 with California license plate 6EKT044, and left. One report claims someone on the street actually saw the car as it departed. 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 from school the morning of May 2.

After playing a bartender in the 1994 film Cobb, a biopic of baseball player Ty Cobb, Smith 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. 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.

Smith 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 University of Hawaii for a season and finished his playing career with the Rainbow Warriors basketball team. Smith set the school's single-season scoring record of 23.4 ppg, a mark that stands despite the subsequent introduction of the three-point field goal.

Smith was from the San Fernando Valley. He was a star player on the Van Nuys High School boys' basketball team in the early 1970s. He was named a second-team All-American by Parade magazine as a senior in 1973. Smith 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.

Gavin Smith (December 10, 1954 – May 2012) was an American college basketball star, actor, stuntman, and film studio executive, formerly a regional manager of distribution for 20th Century Fox. Prior to his eighteen 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 coach John Wooden. He later played at Hawaii, where he set the school's still-standing single-season scoring record of 23.4 points per game. He had a small role as a bartender in Cobb, the 1994 biopic of baseball player Ty Cobb.