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Charges against country artist Conner Smith, following a fatal car accident in June 2025, have been dropped at the request of the victim’s family.
Smith, 25, was driving a Chevrolet Silverado in downtown Nashville, Tennessee, when he allegedly struck Dorothy “Dot” Dobbins, 77, in a crosswalk on June 8, 2025. Dobbins was transported to Vanderbilt University Medical Center before she died. Metro Nashville Police Department officers issued Smith a misdemeanor citation, rather than a felony, for failure to yield resulting in a fatality underscores a lack of criminal intent, per previous reports.
Smith’s attorney, Worrick G Robinson IV, confirmed on Thursday (February 19) that Smith’s charges had been dropped. The Davidson County District Attorney's Office confirmed to Nashville’s WZTV and other news outlets that Dobbins’ family requested the charges dropped.
“This devastating accident was a profound tragedy for the family of Dot Dobbins and the larger Germantown community,” Robinson said in a statement to PEOPLE, TMZ and other news outlets. “Over the past several months, Conner has been grateful for the opportunity to get to know Dot’s family personally and be able to voice his deep and sincere grief. While he is grateful that this legal chapter has concluded, he will continue to steadfastly lift her family up in prayer.”
Smith has previously opened up about the accident in a statement on social media and in an interview on The Upload with Brooke Taylor. The Nashville-born singer-songwriter said in a since-deleted statement on Instagram about a month after the accident, in part: “Not a day has gone by that I haven’t grieved, prayed, and mourned for Ms. Dobbins and her family. My heart is broken in a way I’ve never experienced, and I still struggle to fully process the weight of it all. I ask that you continue to lift the Dobbins family up in prayer by name, asking for God’s peace to surround them each day.”
Smith spoke with iHeartRadio's Brooke Taylor and Pastor Mark Evans on an episode of the faith-based podcast, The Upload, in December 2025. Smith said during the conversation that he’d turned off his phone for weeks after the accident. “It’s like a tornado runs through your house, and there’s so much grief and there’s so much trauma from that. Intense trauma. There’s a darkness in that. There’s no words. …I’ll never forget pulling out my phone (and) the first recommended video was NBC News with my picture. And I just quickly was like, ‘oh, oh, not yet.’ …I have Jesus and I have people around me that love and respect me and know the truth, and inside of that I need nothing else.”
Smith has not publicly commented on the droppeed charges as of publication time on Friday morning (February 20).