Flyover Led to Fatal Raid : Drugs: Warrant says agent in aircraft saw marijuana growing on Malibu ranch of man killed by deputies. None was found.

A drug raid that ended in the fatal shooting of millionaire Ventura County rancher Don Scott was based on aerial surveillance and an informant’s report that Scott’s wife “was seen flashing” $100 bills, according to court papers filed Tuesday.

Aerial surveillance of Scott’s Trail’s End Ranch on Sept. 23 by the federal Drug Enforcement Administration revealed about 50 marijuana plants on the 200-plus-acre ranch, according to the search warrant.

But when a multi-agency drug task force raided Scott’s Malibu ranch on the morning of Oct. 2, no marijuana was found.

Scott, 61, was shot to death by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies when they confronted him in the ranch house living room. According to accounts by deputies and his wife, Scott entered the room with a gun held over his head.

Ordered to put the gun down, Scott was shot twice in the chest as he lowered his arm.

Scott’s wife of three months, Frances Plante, 38, said in an interview that she sometimes carried large amounts of cash because her husband had a deep distrust of government and did not want to leave a paper trail by using credit cards.

The search warrant stated that DEA Agent Charles A. Stowell saw marijuana cultivation on Scott’s ranch while on a surveillance flight over the Santa Monica Mountains. The plants were “growing around some large trees that were in a grove near a house on the property,” the search warrant papers said.

But Nick Gutsue, Scott’s lawyer, said the drug officers “were fishing. I’m beginning to suspect this is more about forfeiture money” than anything else. “There are a bunch of cowboys out there running roughshod over everyone,” he said.

What’s more, Gutsue said, sheriff’s deputies did not have to kill Scott. He said they could have used “a soft takedown using a ruse to get him out of the house.”