STATE
Ex-pageant director reaches plea deal
Greg Smith, accused of withholding scholarship money from pageant contestants, agrees to pay more than $12,000 in restitution and serve two years probation.
It鈥檚 been seven years and eight canceled trials since an Elida rancher was accused of embezzling from the Miss New Mexico Scholarship Organization.
Last month, Greg Smith reached a plea deal with prosecutors.
Smith, 62, agreed to plead guilty to two misdemeanor charges of embezzlement in exchange for two years probation. Smith also agreed to pay more than $12,000 in restitution, court records show.
Investigators in 2017 began looking into complaints that Smith was refusing to give scholarship winnings to three pageant contestants when he was director of the pageant held in Portales.
In 2019, he was indicted by a grand jury on 18 charges, some of them felonies, that ranged from embezzlement and fraud to issuing worthless checks and attempted tax evasion.
With the April 27 plea deal, Smith agreed to pay restitution to former pageant contestants Stephanie Chavez ($2,458.78), Madison Belcher ($6,003.70) and Sherry Smith ($3,625).
Sixteen charges against him were dismissed.
Ninth Judicial District Judge Ben Cross placed Smith on supervised probation for two years. Court records show that probation could be converted to unsupervised after he completes the full restitution payments.
Smith did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The New Mexico鈥檚 Attorney General鈥檚 Office began investigating Smith after former pageant contestants and their parents reported not receiving scholarship monies they鈥檇 won.
Smith was removed as the Miss New Mexico pageant鈥檚 executive director after three years, but not before prosecutors alleged he had accumulated 鈥渁n outstanding owed scholarship balance estimated to be approximately $54,419.75.鈥
Prosecutors alleged Smith used pageant funds to further his ranch business, detailing 鈥渘umerous questionable purchases, withdrawals and transfers.鈥
But court proceedings against Smith were repeatedly delayed.
Trials were scheduled in July 2020, April 2021, September 2022, July 2023, January 2024, March 2024, June 2025, and July 2025, but the trials were always postponed or delayed for a variety of reasons, including plea discussions.
Stephanie Chavez, the reigning pageant queen, in 2017 told the Portales 近距离内射合集-Tribune that she was still owed scholarship winnings from a summer before. She called Smith a 鈥渕anipulative鈥 bully.
Smith said some pageant contestants, including Chavez, had not received their winnings because they had not filled out the proper paperwork.
Smith told the 近距离内射合集-Tribune at that time that when he inherited the Miss New Mexico pageant in 2015 it was 鈥渓oosely run鈥 and many of the proper rules and guidelines had not been followed.
"All I did was come in and enforce the long-standing rules of Miss America. I uphold the ideals of the Miss America organization," he said. "Everyone who knows me knows I'm not a bully, but I expect things to get done."