White Hot Hate: Agent Pale Horse
Season 2, Episode 2: You Got Anything for Rednecks?
Tue, 01 Apr 2025
How does a young, self-proclaimed redneck end up becoming one of the most storied undercover agents of our time? We trace Agent Payne’s path from a satan-worshiping southern high school student, all the way to becoming a “Hillbilly Donnie Brasco.”
Chapter 1: Who is Scott Payne, the 'Hillbilly Donnie Brasco'?
This is families coming to see their kids do karate moves or families coming to see their kids play the violin. And here we are as a rock band and I'm grabbing my crotch in front of everybody. And we probably got to the second verse before they realized what was going on and they started literally closing the curtain on us and pulling the power.
Show's over. The weekend goes by and it's Monday morning. Scott gets called down to Mr. Walker's office.
Mr. Walker was the vice principal. Lloyd Walker. Shorter black guy. He just didn't like me. Maybe I was a smart-ass. I don't know. Maybe it was my look. Maybe it was who I was hanging with. And he called me into his office, and I'm like, man, I didn't grab myself that much. He actually had a tape on VCR, so he played it for me.
Mr. Walker grabs the big, clunky VHS recording of Friday night's talent show, and they watch.
I probably grab my crotch every, I don't know, 30 seconds. So he starts laying into me and I'm like, well, we start talking about different cultures. And, you know, like even Michael Jackson grabs himself on stage, you know, and we start laughing. And next thing you know, we're giggling and cutting up. And that's the first time that ever happened.
And then probably junior year in high school or senior year, word spread that somebody had, uh, basically done malicious damage to Mr. Walker's home. But they had, they not only did they like roll the trees with toilet paper, they spray painted his car. He had like a BMW, I think spray painted it, keyed it, spray painted the house. There were some bad words on there.
Some of them were, I mean, N word, something like that. And, uh, He called me into his office, and I thought, well, what did I do? And he calls me in, and he asked me if I'd be willing to help him, try to figure out who did that to his house. So I started working the circles of people, and I think it was in the gym one day. And, you know, just nonchalant.
Hey, man, man, did you hear what happened to Mr. Walker? Yeah, man, that's messed up, blah, blah, blah, blah. Or, hey, man, you know, screw him. You know, he deserves it kind of thing.
Scott's working his cliques, slash cliques, doing what he does best, blending in, chatting, being a people person.
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Chapter 2: What is the significance of the 'Barn Dominium' in Scott's life?
We pull up to one of these streets that's in a rough neighborhood, high drug trafficking area. And they're like, hey, man, just roll down there. We got the camera already set up. We're just going to roll you through. You got 20 bucks. You're going to buy a rock, a crack rock. Yeah. I'm like, I don't know, 280 pounds. I mean, I do not look like I smoke crack, right? You know, unless I just started.
So, so I, uh, I pulled down the street and I roll up to the corner and man, they're coming up and, uh, and, and they're, they're like, what'd you want? What'd you want? You know? And I'm like, I rolled down the window and I, and I'm like, give me a 20. And I slide the 20 bucks through the window. Like it's, you know, like a, I don't know, like I'm putting something into the ATM or something.
or a vending machine. And the guy gives me, I don't know, a sliver of a rock. It was probably soap for all I know. Who knows? But I was so scared. I was freaking out, man. I was like, you know. But, you know, that's how you start learning.
Scott knew right away that's what he wanted to do. He was not going to stop until he became an undercover agent.
I'm an adrenaline junkie. It's not like I'm jumping out of planes or jumping off of buildings, but you're an adrenaline junkie. And man, that was cool. You get that, oh man, this is awesome.
But there were only so many opportunities that came through the local sheriff's office.
I mean, really, how deep are you going to go deep undercover in your county if you've already been a cop or if when you bust people as a narcotics officer, you have to go to court and testify? I mean, there's only so many ways you can shave your facial hair and grow your hair and change your clothes and change out vehicles before they just they just know.
But during one of his shifts, he was passing the hours with this sergeant who he idolized.
He looked like a bulldog. He was a former Marine, Popeye forearms with a tattoo, I'm pretty sure, of a bulldog on his forearm. If it wasn't a bulldog, it was the Marine Semper Fi and anchor, but he might've had both, I don't know. But he looked like a bulldog. We were on surveillance and I was sitting with him. And at that point, my nickname was Kingpin.
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