Season 1: Episode 1 Damned to Eternity

On today’s episode we are discussing the Flood of 93’ and a devilish plot to destroy a levee for personal gain. One James Robert Scott, is the first and only person in American history to be charged with the crime of causing a catastrophe. Before we get into the devastating details, the audience should be aware of the Flood of 93’ and its tragic effects across the banks of the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers. Then we shall investigate Mr. Scott’s crimes, actions and trial leading to his imprisonment.

To begin we must start well before the flood begins and look at yet another flood to see exactly how things went so wrong. When you live along a river, especially one affected by human activity, flooding is a natural part of a river's life and if caught in one it can be deadly. The Mississippi flood of 1973 was particularly devastating leading to the raising of the levee system. Even to understand the case we have to discuss what a levee is and how it prevents flooding.

Levees are constructed with steel sheet pilings driven into the group and a concrete i-wall built on top. Dirt is piled up to form a domed or raised platform. If the water in the canal or river raises high enough to top the levee the steel and concrete wall and piling are meant to hold back the worst of the water, leading to only some flooding. In the case of the Flood of '93, the levee was breached, meaning that the I wall broke leading to massive flooding.

Now discussing James Scott. James Robert Scott was born in November 1969. By the age of 12, Scott had burned down an elementary. In 1988 he burned down a garage. By age of 23, Scott had been incarcerated 6 times. In 1993 Scott was working at a Burger King where he was recently caught stealing from the register.

The levee broke on July 16, 1993. The damage to Quincy was devastating. In total there was $15B of damages, approximately 30 people died, and there was an evacuation of more than 54 thousand people from their homes. Many small towns were completely destroyed, some remain underwater to this day.

So how does James "Jimmy" Robert Scott tie into this? Police Officers watching the news special on WGEM see James Scott being interviewed about witnessing the levee break. Quoting from the Weather Channel:

“Who’s the first one on the scene but Jimmy Scott. The first one to see it break, Jimmy Scott. What the heck’s he doing over there? So there’s questions that need to be answered,” Neal Baker told weather.com, recalling his reaction. Scott was alone and he wasn’t wearing one of the orange vests that others working on the levee were wearing. He also looked too clean to have been doing hard work on the levee. He looked shifty, like he was lying" (Budnick, 2018).

Because there was not much to hold Scott on, currently they just have him wearing a clean shirt and no orange vest near a broken damn, they decided to arrest him on his recent burglary charges from Burger King. According to records, during interrogation Scott admitted to 3 crimes, breaking the levee being one of them.

The motive that the prosecution proposed comes from Scott's friend, Joe Flach, who stated that Scott broke the levee to strand his wife out of town so he could go drinking, fishing, gambling, and cheating on her.

The trial began in November 1994. The first trial ended in a mistrial due to the prosecution not being forthcoming with all of their evidence and witnesses to the defense. The second trial ended with Scott being the first American found guilty of knowingly causing a catastrophe. Below is Missouri's law in regard to charging someone with the crime of causing a catastrophe:

“A person commits the offense of causing catastrophe if he or she knowingly causes a catastrophe by explosion, fire, flood, collapse of a building, release of poison, radioactive material, bacteria, virus or other dangerous and difficult to confine force or substance.” Catastrophe, in this legal context, is defined as causing death or serious physical injury to ten or more people, or substantial damage to five or more buildings, structures or vital public facilities. It carries a potential life sentence" (Budnick, 2018).

Doubt over Scott's conviction remains. Many believe that Scott was a scapegoat so that members of Quincy would be able to receive insurance for their destroyed homes (Pitluk, 2007).

"By 1998, scientists had a lot more information on the Great Flood of ‘93. Dr. Hammer quickly came to the conclusion that one man could not have caused this levee to break, telling weather.com, “The first day I sat and looked at the films, I thought this levee is going to break. It’s not a matter of if, it’s when and where.”

Hammer focused on the six points necessary for a levee to break, based on a multi-disciplinary study of the 1,083 levees that failed or overtopped during that flood: 1. River is constricted against a hard surface (e.g. a bluff) on one side. 2. River bends after a straight course of at least 3/4 of a mile. 3. Levee is located downstream from a bridge. 4. Wing dikes (built perpendicular to riverbank) are upstream of levee. 5. Less than 250 feet of riparian forest between levee and main river channel. 6. Levee built on a “crevasse splay” (fan-shaped sand deposit left by pre-levee floods).

Hammer said that all six existed at the West Quincy levee in July of 1993" (Budnick, 2018).

Scott's able to apply for parole next year in 2023. We are hoping his case is looked over again.

References

Budnick, N. (2018, July 16). CAUSING A CATASTROPHE. The Weather Channel. https://features.weather.com/causing-a-catastrophe/

Pitluk, A. (2007, December 10). Damned to Eternity: The Story of the Man Who They Said Caused the Flood. Da Capo Press.