The Dateline NBC episode “The Unusual Suspect” investigates the murders of two mothers and their teenage daughters in Prince Georges County, Maryland — and their killer, Jason Thomas Scott. Scott was a UPS worker who had used the company database to target his victims. He killed five women and was convicted of 29 home invasions. In an exchange for a plea deal, Scott, 30, was sentenced to 85 years in prison for strangling Delores Dewitt, 42, and her 20-year-old daughter Ebony. Prosecutors dropped charges in the other killings (mother and daughter Karen and Karissa Lofton, and Vilma Butler).
ATF Special Agent David Cheplak said Scott “took his craft seriously.” Scott studied criminal forensics TV shows which helped him “in his criminal endeavors whether it was hiding his DNA by always wearing gloves, or turning off his cell phone and going so far as taking out the battery because he thought that perhaps the police might be able to trace where his cell phone was at the time of any of these crimes.” Dateline NBC airs Sundays at 10pm.
