'Kill all white people,' suspected serial killer said in 2014

William Cummings | USA TODAY

A black man suspected of fatally shooting five white men, four of them along Kansas City biking and hiking trails, once threatened to "kill all white people," The Kansas City Star reported.

Court documents related to a three-year-old harassment citation say Fredrick Demond Scott, 22, made the statement in January 2014 while threatening to carry out a "Columbine-style" school shooting, according to the Star.

Prosecutors announced Tuesday that Scott is charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of Steven Gibbons, 57, and John Palmer, 54. Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Baker also named Scott as a suspect in the shooting deaths of 67-year-old David Lenox, 57-year-old Timothy S. Rice and 61-year-old Mike Darby.

Palmer, Leno, Rice and Darby were all shot in the back, three of them in the head, on Kansas City trails. Gibbons was shot in the back of the head on a city street, according to prosecutors.

“They didn’t see it coming,” Scott told detectives, according to the Star.

Police said they don't know if the killings were racially driven and are still searching for a motive. Scott is not believed to have known any of the victims.

After his arrest, Scott told detectives he was upset about the shooting death of his brother during a 2015 robbery.

Scott's mother told the Star that her son suffered from paranoid schizophrenia but refused to seek treatment for his condition.

“As far as I know Fredrick never had a problem with white people,” Scott's mother said. “He would do odd jobs for people and some of those people were white men.”

Scott was handed a suspended 180-day sentence for his 2014 threats against the Center Alternative School. He also was found guilty of shoplifting in 2016 and was cited for assaulting his mother in 2013, according to the Star.