Episode 179: Kada Scott – Bite-Sized Crime

A young woman leaves work and vanishes into the night, leaving a trail of digital clues behind. What happened to Kada Scott?

Episode Media

Kada Scott *(The Kada Scott Foundation)*

Awbury Recreation Center parking lot next to abandoned school *(Google Maps)*

Aerial view of Awbury Recreation Center and abandoned school *(Google Maps)*

Keon King *(Philadelphia Police Department)*

Episode Sources

Episode Transcript

Welcome back to Bite-Sized Crime. This week I’m bringing you a recent case, the story of a young woman who made an impact on her community and a family who is still awaiting justice. This episode discusses sensitive topics, so listener discretion is advised.

Kada Yanda Scott was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Described as creative and energetic, Kada always had big dreams for herself. After high school, she enrolled at Pennsylvania State University where she majored in Communications with the goal of becoming an entrepreneur. At just 19 years old, Kada started her own fashion line and opened a beauty spa. She was also a member of the Penn State cheerleading team and competed in pageants, and she was steadily growing an online social media presence. Kada’s ambition and dedication were an inspiration to those who knew her. A friend told WPVI, “She never let anything stop her from doing what she truly wanted to do. That was just special. I really adored that about her.”

After graduating from Penn State, Kada threw herself into making her entrepreneurial dreams come true. She filed for an LLC under the business name “K Kouture” and started saving up money to launch her business while she lived with her mother in East Mount Airy, a quiet residential neighborhood in north Philadelphia. In the fall of 2025, Kada – now 23 years old – got a job working the overnight shift at The Terrace at Chestnut Hill, an assisted living facility just a mile away from home. It was an ideal situation for her; she could work at night and build her business during the day.

Around 9:45 on the evening of Saturday, October 4th, Kada borrowed her mom’s car and headed to work. Her shift was scheduled to begin at 10pm; she would get off the next morning at 6. But when Kada’s mother Kim woke up on Sunday morning, Kada wasn’t there. Kim tried calling her daughter, but Kada’s phone went straight to voicemail.

Next, Kim called Kada’s father, but he hadn’t heard from their daughter either, and his calls to her were also going to voicemail. Kevin Scott later told Dateline that he and Kim were immediately concerned. “[Kada] always has her phone with her — normally always charged. To have the phone totally off, go straight to voicemail, and no texts responding — that’s definitely strange behavior for Kada.”

Kim reached out to Kada’s workplace, hoping that Kada had just gotten caught up at work and let her phone battery run out. But a coworker told Kim that Kada hadn’t finished her shift the night before. She had arrived at 10 and left before 10:30 with no explanation. No one had seen her after that.

At this point, alarm bells were going off. Kada was very responsible; there had to be a reason why she would leave work before her shift was over. Perhaps most alarming was the fact that Kim’s car – the one Kada had borrowed to take to work – was still sitting in the parking lot at The Terrace, right where Kada had left it.

Kim called around to family and friends and got everyone looking around the neighborhood for signs of Kada, checking all the possible routes between her home and work. Had she tried to walk somewhere nearby? Had she hopped on a city bus? Her purse and phone weren’t in the car, so she must have taken them with her. But why? What had caused her to leave work?

Kim contacted the Philadelphia Police Department and reported her daughter missing. Investigators processed the car Kada had been driving but didn’t find anything to indicate foul play. The car was in working condition – no obvious reason why Kada would have abandoned it – and none of her belongings were inside. She usually carried an iPad and Apple Watch with her to work, but they were missing too.

Unfortunately, The Terrace didn’t have outdoor surveillance cameras, so there wasn’t any video evidence of Kada’s movements on October 4th. However, a coworker told investigators that she remembered seeing Kada in the parking lot that night, shortly after she arrived at work. Kada had been talking to someone on the phone, and she had seemed upset. The coworker overheard Kada say, “I can’t believe you’re calling me about this,” before she walked over to a dark-colored vehicle that was parked outside. The car then drove off, presumably with Kada inside.

Investigators pulled Kada’s phone records, which showed that she had received twelve phone calls from the same number between 9:25 and 10:12pm on October 4th, the last call lining up with the time that her coworker saw her outside The Terrace. After that, Kada’s phone appeared to travel southeast before completely stopping all network connections at 10:24pm near the area of Awbury Arboretum, a botanical garden about 3 miles away.

On Wednesday, October 8th, the Philadelphia Police Department held a press conference to share information about Kada’s case and ask the public for assistance. Police Captain John Craig shared that in the days prior to her disappearance, Kada had revealed to family and friends that someone was harassing her by phone. Investigators were exploring the possibility of that unknown person being connected to Kada’s case, but they needed new leads. Captain Craig said, “Any information, no matter how small, it would be of great use to detectives investigating this case. No matter what information you have, think of it as a possible piece of a large jigsaw puzzle… If there’s a hundred pieces to a puzzle, you may think yours is insignificant, but without your piece, that jigsaw puzzle is not being solved.”

Kada’s family was present at the press conference, and they shared that Kada was a bright young woman who was close to her family. She would never go missing on purpose. Her father Kevin said, “I’m thinking positive. She’s OK, wherever she’s at, and we’re going to find her. That’s what I’m thinking right now.”

One of the most important pieces of the puzzle was the question of who Kada had been talking to on the phone the night she disappeared. Investigators learned that in the days leading up to her disappearance, Kada had exchanged text messages with that same phone number – a person who identified themselves only as “Kel.” On the morning of October 4th, Kada texted Kel, “kidnap me again.” Kel responded, “better be up too.” They planned to meet up later that night, and at 10:09pm, shortly after she arrived at work, Kada told Kel to call her when they arrived. This clearly lined up with the timeline Kada’s coworker had given to police.

The text messages were confusing to investigators. What had Kada meant when she texted “kidnap me again”? Was she joking or being sarcastic? Had this Kel tried to kidnap her before, and was Kada calling them out on it? Or was it some kind of game they were playing?

Investigators determined that Kel’s phone number was connected to a Verizon account which was registered to a woman who lived on Belmont Terrace in Southwest Philadelphia. Phone location data showed that Kada’s phone had traveled alongside Kel’s phone before turning off; Kel’s phone had then traveled alone to a house on Belmont Terrace.

On October 9th, police executed a search warrant on the house, and two women were detained. The women denied knowing where Kada was or what had happened to her, but investigators suspected that they were covering for someone. Three phones and a tablet were taken into evidence along with latex gloves, a hammer, 9mm ammunition, and heavy duty trash bags.

Through further analysis of the phone data, investigators were able to narrow their focus to one individual – a 21-year-old man named Keon King. King was known to use multiple phones and multiple aliases, one of them being “Kel”.

With this information, pieces of the puzzle began to fit together, including a random incident that had seemed unconnected at first. The night before Kada disappeared, officers had responded to a report of a car theft in Mount Airy. A delivery worker had left his car running while dropping off a package, when suddenly, a man matching Keon King’s description jumped into the driver’s seat of his black 2008 Hyundai Accent and fled the scene. Four days later, the car was found in an alley two miles away, fully engulfed in flames. Investigators felt strongly that this was somehow related to Kada’s disappearance, they just had to prove it.

Keon King had a vehicle registered to him – a gold 1999 Toyota Camry – so investigators wondered what reason he would have for stealing someone else’s car, unless he wasn’t actually in possession of the Camry. Using King’s phone location data to create a map of his movements in the days surrounding Kada’s disappearance, investigators found video footage from police surveillance cameras throughout the city that showed King’s gold Camry traveling that same path with King at the wheel. The Camry had even been stopped three times by traffic cops where King was listed as the driver; during one of those stops, one of the women from Belmont Terrace had been listed as his passenger. Not only did this prove that King had his own vehicle, but it clearly connected him to the residents of Belmont Terrace.

On October 10th, police launched a full-scale search of Awbury Arboretum, the area where Kada’s cell phone had last pinged. Deputy Commissioner Frank Vanore told reporters that the department was using every resource available to cover the 55-acre park, including drones and search dogs. “At this point, we’re just trying to do everything we can. We do everything we can to make sure we run down every lead.” Unfortunately, nothing of significance was found during the search, but investigators still believed the location was important to the case.

Based on the phone data placing Kada and King in the same locations on the night of October 4th, investigators felt they had enough to make an arrest while they continued to search for Kada. On October 14th, King was taken into custody and charged with kidnapping, reckless endangerment, false imprisonment, stalking, criminal use of a communication facility, and tampering with evidence. His bond was set at $2.5 million.

At a press conference, Deputy Commissioner Vanore said that they had strong evidence connecting Kada and King. “Our evidence is pretty clear that she was in communication with an individual, that individual appears to meet her very shortly after she leaves her place of work, and very shortly after that, she disappears.”

Police also announced that they were searching for King’s gold Camry and asked the public to be on the lookout. They believed Kada may have been inside that vehicle at some point and finding it could be an important lead.

Shortly after the press conference, police received a tip that there might be evidence at an abandoned school on Ardleigh Street which sat adjacent to the arboretum. During a search of the school property, teams recovered Kada’s debit card and her pink phone case.

A few hours later, the gold Camry was spotted in Philadelphia’s East Falls neighborhood. The car had been parked at the Gypsy Lane Condominiums for five days before a resident saw the news reports and called it in. Police immediately seized the vehicle and sent it to the lab for processing. Surveillance footage from the condominium confirmed that a man matching King’s description parked the car on October 10th and accessed the trunk several times before leaving the car behind.

Even with this much progress in the case, Kada was still missing, and her family was desperate for answers. They found an old iPad that was still connected to Kada’s iCloud account and immediately turned it over to investigators. The data confirmed that her iPhone and new iPad last connected to the network shortly before 10:30pm on October 4th. But her Apple Watch stayed connected until 1:14am on the 5th, where it pinged in the parking lot at the Awbury Recreation Center. By that time, King’s cell phone had left the area, but investigators wondered if Kada’s watch had somehow been left behind, either by accident or on purpose.

Unfortunately, a search of the parking lot didn’t turn up the watch, but surveillance video from the rec center provided investigators with new, compelling evidence against Keon King.

At 10:28pm on October 4th, video showed a dark-colored vehicle pulling into the rec center parking lot and backing into a spot next to the playground. The car was similar in make and model to the black Hyundai Accent that had been stolen on October 3rd. The driver got out and began walking across the playground toward the abandoned school building; they didn’t come back.

On the night of October 5th, shortly before midnight, King’s gold Camry was seen pulling into the rec center parking lot and parking across from the Hyundai Accent. This time, two people exited the Camry and walked toward the playground. Four and a half hours later, the same two people walked back through the playground and approached the Hyundai Accent. They motioned to the gold Camry, which turned on its headlights and drove away. Clearly, whoever was in the driver’s seat had been waiting for their signal.

In the glow of the streetlights, the two people left behind approached the passenger side of the Hyundai Accent and pulled out a large, clearly heavy object. Together, they carried it back across the playground towards the abandoned school. They returned an hour and a half later, sat inside the car for a few minutes, then exited again before walking away one last time. The car sat abandoned until 2:45 the next morning, when someone drove it away. Forty-five minutes later, the car was found on fire in an alley 2 miles away.

According to a police affidavit, Keon King’s cell phone data matched the activities captured in the surveillance footage. His phone quite literally placed him at the scene of the crime.

On October 18th, not long after the discovery of the rec center footage, police received an anonymous tip telling them to check the abandoned school again. This time, a grid search revealed freshly disturbed earth – a shallow grave dug along the northeast boundary of the school property. Human remains were recovered, and DNA testing confirmed that they belonged to 23-year-old Kada Scott. An autopsy would later reveal that she had died from a gunshot wound to the head.

Keon King’s charges were amended to include murder, arson, and conspiracy, and his bail was revoked. The district attorney’s office announced that they were also exploring the possibility that King had accomplices based on what was shown in the surveillance footage. Philadelphia Police Commissioner Kevin Bethel told local residents that the case wasn’t closed. “We continue to pursue anyone who helped, who concealed, who participated in this act.”

In a statement to the press, Kada’s parents expressed their grief at the loss of their beloved daughter and thanked the community for their support. “Our hearts are shattered, yet we are deeply grateful for the outpouring of love, support, and prayers from people across the nation and around the world… Kada was deeply loved. Her light, kindness, and beautiful spirit will forever remain in our hearts.”

In the days following, the community gathered together to honor Kada’s memory. They collected donations of food and supplies for Kada’s family, and public officials vowed to make changes that would protect women in the community from situations of domestic violence, including efforts by the district attorney’s office to create a domestic violence offender unit. Kada’s father expressed his gratitude and hope for change, saying, “Hopefully Kada’s case creates awareness for the whole city, puts pressure on the people, the powers that be that can make the changes.”

On November 8, 2025, hundreds of people gathered for Kada’s memorial service. Friends and family were dressed in pink, her favorite color, and everyone shared memories of the bright, beautiful young woman who had big dreams and an even bigger heart. The mayor of Philadelphia and the governor of Pennsylvania were in attendance, a testament to the impact Kada’s story had on the community.

Ten days later, on what would have been Kada’s 24th birthday, her family announced the creation of the Kada Scott Foundation. Their goal is to empower young women in Philadelphia through scholarships, small business grants, and community programs. The family also continues to fight for justice for Kada. On the foundation website, the family states, “Justice for Kada is not only about the courtroom — it’s about protecting her legacy, uplifting other young women, and bringing light and love into the community she touched. We thank everyone who stands with us through every step of this journey.”

In February of 2026, a Philadelphia judge ruled that Keon King would face trial in the kidnapping and murder of Kada Scott. As of this recording, he is still in jail awaiting trial, and police are continuing to investigate possible accomplices. If you have any information about the case, please contact the Philadelphia Police Department at 215-686-8477 or submit a tip online at phillypolice.com.

And if you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse, please contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or text START to 88788 for free and confidential help. You don’t have to suffer alone.