CONCORD, N.H. • New Hampshire’s highest court on Wednesday turned away the latest attempt to get a sentence reduction for Pamela Smart, who is serving life in prison for plotting with her teenage lover to have her husband killed in 1990.

Smart, 55, was a 22-yearold high school media coordinator when she began an affair with a 15-year-old student who later shot and killed her husband, Gregory Smart. He was freed in 2015 after serving a 25-year sentence. Though she denied knowledge of the plot, she was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder and other crimes and sentenced to life without parole.

Having exhausted her judicial appeal options, Smart returned for a third time to an elected state council, seeking a sentence reduction hearing last year.

The five-member Executive Council, which approves state contracts and appointees to the courts and state agencies, rejected her latest request in less than three minutes, prompting another appeal to state Supreme Court.

The justices dismissed the petition Wednesday, saying it would violate the separation of powers to order the council to reconsider a “political” question.

“This ruling by the New Hampshire Supreme Court is a continuing disappointment that devastates our hopes for Pamela Smart finally receiving reasonable and fair process in the State of New Hampshire,” Smart’s spokeswoman, Eleanor Pam, said in an email.

She added that Smart “has never been given the opportunity to be heard or allowed to make her case directly. Pamela Smart is fully rehabilitated and is no danger to society.”

The state attorney general’s office has opposed commutation for Smart, saying she has never accepted full responsibility for the crimes.

Smart, who has earned two master’s degrees behind bars, tutored fellow inmates, been ordained as a minister and is part of an inmate liaison committee, said in her latest petition that she is remorseful and has been rehabilitated. She apologized to Gregory Smart’s family, though relatives said she has failed to take full responsibility.

A cousin of Gregory Smart was glad to hear of the court’s dismissal.

“She has had more than her fair share of being heard,” Val Fryatt said. “It is not easy for us. We are coming up on 33 years without Gregg, and never once has she admitted her part, so I am unsure how she is rehabilitated. Gregg is the true victim in all of this. Pamela needs to admit what she did not only for my family’s sake but for her family’s sake, as well.”

Smart’s longtime attorney, Mark Sisti, argued that the elected council “brushed aside” her chance at freedom, spending no time discussing her voluminous petition — which included many letters of support from inmates, supervisors and others — before rejecting her request.

“We will not stop our attempts to free Pam Smart,” Sisti said in a statement. Smart can refile a petition with the council every two years.