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Daniel "Dan" Robert Scott is a fictional character on the television show One Tree Hill played by Paul Johansson.

My name is Dan Scott. I killed my brother.

— Dan Scott

He is the father of Lucas Scott (by Karen Roe) and Nathan Scott (by Deborah Lee),the grandfather of James Scott, and a former basketball player. When Karen got pregnant he had already received a scholarship for college. After talking with Whitey he broke up with her and went to college, where he met Deb. The night he decided to give up basketball and go back to Karen, Deb told him she was pregnant and he decided to stay with her.

Although he became a successful businessman selling cars thanks to his wife's money his life was full of regrets. Since he didn't want Nathan to become the same, he pushed him to become a basketball player but in some way destroyed the lives of all the people around him.

fled him at the beginning were a lie. As Lucas realizes that Dan didn't abandon him and did want to be in his life. At the end of the season he sells the car dealership (it cost millions of dollars to run it every day.)

Because of this he spent most of season 2 plotting against Deb and Keith, using Deb's guilt to keep her in his life and by paying "Jules" to break his brother's heart. However he does try and get closer to Lucas, motives for this are unknown. He asks Lucas to move in with him, Lucas agrees to but on one condition, Dan leaves Keith alone and lets Keith be happy with "Jules". Dan fulfills his promise but Karen finds out that "Jules" isn't who she says she is, and tells Keith. Keith goes to Dan and asks him if he set him up and Dan admits it causing a massive bust up which puts an almighty rift between the brothers. Motives behind Lucas wanting to live with Dan also become clearer, when we discover that Lucas wants to bring down Dan once and for all, Lucas discovers that Dan had been taking money illegally from his car dealership. Any sale above 10 thousand is supposed to be reported to the IRS, but Dan was changing the amounts on the bills and pocketing the extra cash. But Dan was very clever as he had made Deb the co-owner of the dealership, which meant that she would go down with him. Dan also reveals that everything had been a test of Lucas's loyalty, which Lucas had gravely failed, and so tells Lucas that he has severed all ties to him, meaning Lucas won't get any of the study fund that Dan had saved up for him. His relationship with Nathan never fully heals, as Nathan never fully trusts Lucas. Dan is strongly against the marriage of his son to Haley James as he believes it could damage Nathan's chances of a real future in life and in basketball. So when Nathan's marriage is going through its troubles Dan is the one who is quick to pounce, and at the end of the season gets Nathan to sign the divorce papers and to move back in with him and Deb. But at the end of season 2 he was once again caught in a near death situation as someone had drugged him and set fire to his dealership.

He first thought it was Lucas who started the fire, when he remembered seeing him in the fire but it was revealed that Lucas saved him. He then thought it was Keith when he saw that he was the one who had bought the whiskey used to drug him, and because of Keith's re-emergence he beings strongly to suspect Keith of foul play. He was also elected mayor of Tree Hill thanks to his family-based campaign and many deceptions (including having Deb pretend to love him in exchange for a final divorce). As mayor he had Keith arrested on suspicion of his attempted murder, but the police let him go as they have no evidence to suggest that Keith had done anything. Dan still believes that Keith was the perpetrator, and things are made worse when Keith announces that he is going to marry Karen, and adopt Lucas. One day at Tree Hill High, Jimmy Edwards brings a gun to school and fires it, causing a lock down. Keith went in to talk him out of the hostage situation, but Jimmy committed suicide in front of Keith. Dan went in picked up the gun and shot Keith, in cold blood. Dan afterwards showed no remorse strongly believing that Keith deserved what he had got, as Keith tried to kill him. But Dan became haunted by Keith's ghost and this had a profound effect on him. Realizing he had to change his ways he tried to get closer to Nathan, and in one touching moment where he was totally sincere he told Nathan that he was proud of him and that he loved him. Dan was totally broken when it was finally revealed to be Deb who had tried to kill him when she told Dan at Nathan and Haley's second wedding. Dan, devastated by the fact that he had killed his brother for no reason and still haunted by Keith's ghost as a child, threatened to kill Deb. He apologized to Karen for what he did to her and Lucas and that he would be there for her now, she then revealed that she was pregnant with Keith's child. They then embraced as she sought comfort in Dan's arms. He then went home and on the wall someone had written "MURDERER" to Dan's horror.

Dan tries to make amends for the cause of Keith's death. He is taking care of the very pregnant Karen and even went as her date to a basketball banquet and they become close friends. Nathan was in deep debt and had to ask Dan to help him. He refused but when Nathan opened up to him about his deal with Daunte, Dan agrees to help. He confronts Daunte but they may have been bitter enemies in their early years. After the State Championship basketball game, Daunte runs Haley over and crashes in a construction site. Nathan proceeds to beat him up, thinking it killed him, Dan takes the fall and goes to jail. Keith visits him as a ghost and forgives him. He is then set free but someone continues to haunt him. He later finds out that this person is Abby Brown, who was in the tutor center the day of the shooting, and witnessed the murder. Dan went to see Abby and she confirms to him that she saw everything and hopes that he burn in Hell. He agrees with Abby and gave her a teddy bear before he went out the door. Abby leaves Tree Hill for good, but not before telling Lucas what she knows. Lucas tries to convince his mother and the police of that Dan murdered his uncle, but neither will believe him. When this happens, he is pushed too far and brings a gun into his home. As Dan and Karen have dinner, Lucas calls Dan's cell as Abby and threatens to go to the police. As Dan gets up, he sees Lucas in the doorway with a gun pointed at him. As the two argue, Karen collapses. Dan motions towards her, but Lucas tells him that if he touches her, he WILL kill him. Dan moves closer to her, right as Lucas pulls the trigger. Lucas missed on purpose and told him to leave him and his mother alone. He visits his new niece in the hospital and decides to turn himself in to the police.

While in jail, Karen confronts Dan about how Lily, Karen's daughter with Keith, will never know her father because of Dan. Dan is so distraught by the encounter he tries to hang himself in his cell with his bedsheet. Due to his size, however, the sheet unravels after a few seconds, and Dan falls to the floor, left to agonize over everything he has done.

Nathan visits Dan in prison, and tells him that Jamie found a picture of Dan once, so Nathan told him that his grandfather was dead. However, by the end of the episode, a prison guard tells Dan that Nathan left something earlier in an envelope in which is a picture of Jamie^[1]. In episode 6 of the season Jamie begin to have nightmares of Dan attacking him in his sleep. When questioned who told him about Dan being alive, Jamie tells Nathan Skills told him. Skills said that he was in jail because he didn't clean his room. At the end of the episode Haley and Nathan confront him and tell him that he is in jail because he did a lot of bad stuff and that they would protect him if he got out again.