scott sessions: Dateline: 5 harrowing details about Scott Sessions’ murder, explored

NBC’s Dateline episode titled, The Last Weekend, depicts the story of the horrifying murder of musician Scott Sessions on February 8, 2020, by Kevin Eastman.

After not turning up for a gig, Sessions’ friends and family begin to worry about the Trumpet player, and their worries turn into reality after the police discover a half-burned body in Poudre Canyon, Colorado.

Here are 5 shocking details about Scott Sessions’ murder.

Dateline: The Last Weekend - 5 details about Scott Sessions’ murder

1) Discovering the partially burned body

Scott Sessions did not attend a gig at The Candlelight Dinner Playhouse, February 10, 2020, which worried his friends and family. On the same night, a snow plow driver discovered a half-burned body on Poudre Canyon, which the police had trouble identifying due to being burned.

However, Stanley’s missing persons report helped them to identify the body of his 53-year-old son, Scott Sessions. As per Dateline, Scott’s body was found wrapped in plastic, with the autopsy report revealing that Scott was killed by slitting his throat and burning the body.

2) Heather Frank’s connection

The police initially interviewed Scott’s ex-girlfriend as they had an erratic relationship. However, they found out that their relationship was amicable, and Scott even sent her a voicemail to tell her to have a good day, the day before he died.

Their attention was then turned to the new woman in his life, a waitress from Doug’s Diner in Loveland, Heather Frank. With the Facebook Messenger texts, the investigator found that Scott was to meet Frank on February 8, 2025. However, in his last text, he asked her where she was, making it unclear if they had met that day or not.

Later, in the surveillance footage from around the place, the police caught an unidentified man driving Scott’s car to the grocery store parking lot near Scott’s home in Greeley, Colorado. The man was later identified as Kevin Eastman, Frank’s abusive, frequent ex.

3) Surveilling Frank and Eastman

The investigation was now turned in the duo’s direction as the police acquired phone records of Frank and Eastman and found that both of them were present in Frank's apartment on February 8, 2020, with Scott. As per Dateline, they also found out that both of them later traveled to Poudre Canyon, where Scott’s half-burned body was discovered a couple of days later.

To gather more evidence, the police placed tracking devices on their cars, with the help of which they were later able to follow Eastman to the rural farm in Weld County.

4) Eastman commits another before being arrested

After following him through the rural areas of Colorado, Larimer County Lt. Donnie Robbins and the other investigators noticed unusual activity from Eastman when he made multiple stops while traveling to the farm.

According to Dateline, he was later found to be lighting a fire to burn something on the farm. Fearing he might destroy crucial evidence, Lt. Robbins arrested Eastman while he visited a gas station to refill his cans. However, they were unable to find Heather.

Eastman refused to be involved in Scott’s murder and also told the police he had no idea where Frank was. But his lie did not hold up for long as Heather Frank’s body was discovered on the same farm, who died after being shot.

5) Kevin Eastman’s trial and sentencing

After nearly two years of Scott’s murder, Eastman was found guilty of two first-degree murders on July 20, 2022. Other than receiving two life sentences, he also received an additional 27 years in prison.

Larimer County Sheriff’s investigator Justin Atwood shared how he still regrets the decision not to arrest Eastman and Frank sooner, as it might have saved Frank’s life at least. He told Dateline:

"We didn’t make the decision to murder Heather Frank. That was a decision that Kevin Eastman made, but it sits with me day in and day out. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about that decision and what could we have done differently."