Samantha Scott Case: Cover-Up, Plea Deal, and Sentence

Samantha Scott is the Nevada woman at the center of the Samantha Scott case tied to the 2021 Lake Tahoe murder of Gary Spohr. She worked as a nanny and horse-ranch helper for former MLB pitcher Daniel Serafini and his wife Erin Spohr, drove Serafini to and from the shooting of his in-laws in Homewood, California, and helped him dispose of evidence. After more than a year in jail, she pleaded guilty in February 2025 to being an accessory after the fact, testified as the prosecution’s key witness at Serafini’s trial, and was sentenced in March 2026 to two years of probation.¹

Who Samantha Scott Is

Scott met Erin Spohr around 2016 through Erin’s horseback riding business. She started doing odd jobs for the family, including babysitting the couple’s two young sons, in exchange for riding lessons, and she became a close friend of Erin’s and an informal ranch employee.²

Scott later testified that her relationship with Serafini turned into an affair about five months after the June 2021 shooting. At trial, Erin Spohr testified that she and Serafini had an open marriage and that she knew about the relationship. Scott kept up both the friendship with Erin and the affair with Serafini until she and Serafini were arrested in October 2023.³

What She Did the Night of the Shooting

On June 5, 2021, Scott drove Serafini from Nevada toward Lake Tahoe. She testified she believed the trip was to pick up drugs. On the way, she watched him test-fire a handgun fitted with a makeshift silencer made from PVC pipe into a sandy hillside off the freeway.⁴ Before they arrived, Serafini told her to peel identifying stickers off her car windows and turn off her phone so they could not be tracked.²

She dropped him off roughly two miles from the home of his in-laws, 70-year-old Gary Spohr and 68-year-old Wendy Wood, and waited at a nearby market for several hours. Serafini shot both victims in the head. Gary Spohr died from a single gunshot wound. Wendy Wood survived with severe brain damage and died by suicide in March 2023.¹

Scott picked Serafini up afterward and drove back toward Nevada. Along Interstate 80, he threw clothing, a backpack, gloves, shoes, and the gun out the car window. Investigators later searched 133 miles of the highway and parts of Lake Tahoe and never recovered the weapon or the discarded items.⁵

The Two Years She Covered for Him

In the weeks after the shooting, Serafini told Scott to lie if investigators questioned her, coaching her to say the two had been in Elko, Nevada, looking at trucks. He intentionally damaged her car’s tailgate to make it less recognizable and asked to be added to her cell phone plan to frustrate anyone checking phone records.⁴

Detectives came for her in November 2021, five months after the shooting, serving a search warrant at her Reno apartment and recording an interview. They pressed her, saying there was no way she had waited hours for Serafini with no communication, and warned her they would recommend homicide charges. She admitted driving him to Tahoe but stuck to the story that she thought the trip was about picking up cocaine.⁶

She testified that she kept lying for about a year and a half. She described a “solid trauma bond” with Serafini and a “delusion” that the situation would resolve on its own. Even after both were jailed, they communicated through smuggled notes known as jail kites. In one, Serafini wrote that he was working on a book to pay their legal fees and warned that he had “a long reach.”³

Both were arrested on October 20, 2023, more than two years after the shooting. Serafini was taken into custody in Winnemucca, Nevada. Scott was arrested in Las Vegas with the help of the U.S. Marshals. Both waived extradition and were transported to Placer County.⁷

The Plea Deal

Scott was originally charged with murder and first-degree residential burglary, the same core charges Serafini faced. A conviction on those counts could have brought 25 years to life in prison.⁸

In January 2025, she entered a “Queen for a Day” agreement with prosecutors, under which her statements could not be used against her.⁵ On February 6, 2025, she pleaded guilty to a single felony count of being an accessory after the fact under California Penal Code Section 32. Prosecutors dropped the murder and burglary charges. The accessory charge carried a maximum of three years.⁹

After the plea, Scott was released on her own recognizance with GPS ankle monitoring. She had to surrender her passport and could not travel more than 150 miles from Reno without permission. Judge Garen J. Horst sealed the plea agreement itself to prevent potential harassment or intimidation.⁹

What She Told the Jury

Scott testified over three days during Serafini’s six-week murder trial in June 2025. Because the gun and the clothing Serafini wore were never recovered, her account was the prosecution’s main tool for placing him at the scene and describing what happened.⁴

She testified that Serafini privately told her he had “shot Wendy twice in the head and once in the hand.”⁵
She described the clothing he wore that night, including long pants, a long-sleeved shirt, running shoes, and a face mask taken from her car’s console. Surveillance video from a neighboring home showed a figure matching that description near the victims’ house.¹⁰
She listed the items Serafini threw from the car on I-80, matching the prosecution’s theory about the missing physical evidence.¹⁰
She described watching Serafini test-fire the gun into a sandy hillside along the freeway to confirm it worked.⁴

Defense attorney David Dratman went after her hard. He argued her testimony was “designed to fill in the weaknesses” of the prosecution’s case and that she had a powerful reason to cooperate: her plea deal spared her a possible life sentence.⁴ Scott acknowledged on the stand that she had lied to investigators repeatedly over the span of years. She also said she still loved Serafini.¹⁰

The jury found Serafini guilty of first-degree murder, attempted murder, and first-degree burglary in July 2025, along with the special circumstance allegations of lying in wait and felony murder. He was sentenced in February 2026 to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The sentencing judge later noted that Scott’s testimony was “corroborated by the evidence.”¹¹

Her Sentence

Judge Horst sentenced Scott on March 16, 2026, in Placer County Superior Court. She received two years of probation, the term agreed to in her plea deal. With credit for time served and good behavior, she had already served the equivalent of the maximum three-year sentence for the accessory charge, with roughly 170 additional days remaining. After completing those days, she would be released to serve probation. The judge also ordered that she have no contact with Serafini.¹

The sentence drew a sharp response from the victims’ family. Adrienne Spohr, the daughter of Gary Spohr and Wendy Wood, told the court that Scott “allowed a killer to roam free” and called her silence “reckless” and “intentional.” She argued that if Scott had told the truth earlier, her mother would still be alive, saying her “mom’s blood is on Samantha Scott’s hands.”¹

1
Sacramento Bee. Dan Serafini, Samantha Scott to Be Sentenced in Tahoe Shooting
2
People. Where Is Daniel Serafini’s Mistress Now
3
KCRA. Dan Serafini Murder Trial: Samantha Scott Testimony
4
Sacramento Bee. Samantha Scott Testimony in Serafini Murder Trial
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KCRA. Dan Serafini Murder Trial: Samantha Scott Testimony, Day Three
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KCRA. Police Interview Released for Samantha Scott
7
WCHS-TV. Former MLB Pitcher Arrested in High-Profile Lake Tahoe Murder Case
8
Sacramento Bee. Samantha Scott Original Charges in Tahoe Shooting
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Sacramento Bee. Suspect in Tahoe Murder Pleads Guilty
10
Fox 40. Crucial Testimony in Daniel Serafini Trial: Samantha Scott
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Sierra Sun. Samantha Scott Sentenced for Involvement in Homewood Shooting