Missouri Man, James Scott, Caused Massive Flood Of 14,000 Acres Just To Stop Wife From Coming Home So He Could Keep Partying

Ever gone to great lengths to snag something you really wanted?

Maybe you played a little mind game, tapped into someone's softer side, or something along those lines?

But have you ever gone as far as causing a flood that wreaked havoc for five whole months and resulted in billions in damages? 

That's not a common occurrence, but James Scott from Missouri was accused of exactly that.

The flood damaged thousands of homes. Brooks Kraft LLC/Sygma via Getty Images

If the Great Flood of 1993 rings a bell, you might have heard of Scott. 

If not, well, you're in for a story.

The scene was set in late 1992, when a rainy season left the soil and reservoirs in the Missouri and Upper Mississippi River basins unusually soggy.

The weather didn't let up, and storms continued to pound the area. 

The rivers surged so powerfully that levees, which were meant to keep the rivers at bay, were overwhelmed from Iowa to Missouri.

Out of the more than 1,000 levees that gave way during the Great Flood, Scott was pinpointed for tampering with one.

The spotlight turned on Scott after he appeared on a local news segment, claiming he had spotted water seeping through one of the levees.

"I tried throwing sand bags, you know, and it didn't work," Scott explained.

Given that the levee had been checked just two hours before it failed, authorities got suspicious and pulled Scott in for a chat.

He was let go but got picked up again in October 1993 on a burglary charge unrelated to the flood.

During this arrest, he confessed to police that he had removed some sandbags from the levee right before the flood hit, as per CourtTV.

He argued he was just trying to highlight a weak spot in the levee, but a witness later testified that Scott had a different motive.

He supposedly told his buddies he'd have the chance to 'party' if his wife got stuck at her job at a restaurant in Taylor, Missouri, due to the flooding.

Scott has maintained his innocence. Brooks Kraft LLC/Sygma via Getty Images

He also thought it would make for 'ideal fishing conditions.'

Prosecutors suggested Scott went as far as to tamper with the plastic sheeting on the levee, digging into the sand until water poured through.

The 1993 flood was devastating: 47 people lost their lives, around 54,000 were evacuated, and the damage totaled somewhere between $15 to $20 billion.

Scott ended up being convicted of Intentionally Causing a Catastrophe, a serious offense, and got a sentence of 20 years to life.

However, in a 2018 interview with ABC17, Scott stood by his innocence, saying, "I can't sit here and prove to you that I did not break the West Quincy Levee."

"Yet, they never proved at my trial that I did. Because I did not break the West Quincy Levee."

"The judge said, 'We found you guilty on circumstantial evidence.' I'm thinking, 'Yeah, I know you did.' There was no solid evidence." 

Scott remains adamant that the flood was a natural disaster, not his doing.