Cyberpredator who terrorized SC FBI agent lived a “double life” as a law officer

For days earlier this year, a person who called himself “slimybanana” posted numerous messages on anti-government internet chat groups urging people to seek out and kill a South Carolina FBI agent and his wife by burning their house down and letting them “cook to death.”

On Wednesday, the culprit was unmasked and on full view in a public court room at the Columbia federal courthouse.

It turns out he is an ex-Marine and a law enforcement officer who works at the Connecticut Department of Corrections.

Scott Robert Tardy, 31, of Holyoke, Mass., pleaded guilty to federal felony charges of cyberstalking, making false statements and obstruction of justice before U.S. Judge Joe Anderson. Obstruction of justice carries a maximum 20-year prison sentence; the other two charges carry five-year maximums.

More than 30 FBI agents, analysts and staff jammed Judge Anderson’s small third-floor courtroom Wednesday morning to show support for their colleague and hear Assistant U.S. Attorney Elle Klein recite detailed charges against Tardy.

Anderson took the plea, telling Tardy — a six-foot, fit-looking man with a short military haircut and dressed in a blue suit, white shirt and yellow tie — that sentencing will take place in two or three months. Tardy answered questions during the hearing in a polite, clear voice.

No motive was given for the crime. Neither was it clear how Tardy knew the agent, who was identified in charging documents only by his initials.

More information will likely emerge when Tardy is sentenced at a future hearing.

After Tardy pleaded guilty, the FBI group walked down one flight, crowded into another small courtroom and bore witness to Assistant U.S. Attorney Elliott Daniels giving even more details about Tardy’s bizarre and dangerous crimes.

Tardy had lived a “double life,” Daniels said, functioning as a corrections officer in the Connecticut prison system but also getting on the internet and using sophisticated methods of encryption on Telegram and Kik messaging platforms to hide his identity and solicit others to harm the FBI agent and his wife.

“This case had a severe impact on law enforcement, as you can tell by the FBI agents here,” Daniels said.

Magistrate Judge Paige Jones Gossett gave Tardy a $25,000 unsecured bond with numerous restrictions.

Weighing in Tardy’s favor was that, as of Wednesday, he still held a job at the Connecticut Department of Corrections and he had voluntarily showed up in Columbia for Wednesday’s hearing.

Tardy had also pleaded guilty to an information (statement of charges) and his attorney, Katherine Evatt, said in court that Tardy would soon check into a psychiatric in-patient facility in Massachusetts.

In response to prosecutor Daniels’ assertion that the victimized FBI agent and his wife still felt threatened, Gossett ordered Tardy to wear a GPS-equipped ankle location monitor.

Citing evidence in the case to Judge Anderson during the guilty plea hearing, prosecutor Klein told the judge that Tardy had posted “numerous threatening and harassing messages using his cellular phone and the Kik and Telegram platforms in anti-government and anti-law enforcement groups.... he called for violence against victims (the FBI agent and his wife),” Klein said.

Unknown to Tardy, he encountered an “undercover law enforcement agent” who began to gather evidence of what Tardy was saying in the chat groups, Klein said.

At one point, Klein said, Tardy discussed throwing a Molotov cocktail (a bottle filled with flammable liquid) in the bedroom of the FBI agent’s home when he was sleeping and “cook to death” the agent.

Tardy sought out members of groups that were hostile to law enforcement and who could “expose and dox” the agent, Klein said. (Doxing is sharing private information online about someone without their permission.)

Tardy also shared a map showing the agent’s house and its address and published photos of the agent’s wife, Klein said.

Klein continued, “Tardy discussed what the cartel would do to the agent and his wife, saying ‘I want her ruined and destroyed i have legit fantasies’. He also said he wanted her tortured for days on end.”

“The undercover agent asked, So having her **** burned isn’t good enough?’ Tardy said it is, if victim 2 (the wife) is inside and then asked if the burning could be recorded,” Klein told the judge.

The FBI quickly began to track down the user of the Kik and Telegram accounts, a trail that led them to Tardy.

In February, days after the harassment began, FBI agents executed a search warrant at Tardy’s residence and advised him that it would be a crime for him to delete or destroy evidence, Klein said.

Shortly thereafter, Klein said, Tardy rendered his cell phone unusable and made false statements to agents, denying that he was the one who had harassed the FBI agent. Tardy also bought a new Apple iPhone and began using that, Klein said.

In a measure of the case’s importance, U.S. Attorney Bryan Stirling attended Wednesday’s guilty plea along with FBI contingent.

Stirling, who was formally nominated on Tuesday to be permanent U.S. Attorney by President Trump, said, “The prosecution in this case did a great job to bring this case to court, and the FBI did a great job in the investigation.”

Tardy’s attorney, Evatt, told Gossett that as of Wednesday he still was a corrections officer. But apparently noting that now Tardy is a convicted felon, Evatt said, “That could change tomorrow.”

This story was originally published July 2, 2025 at 3:10 PM.