General Hospital spoilers: has the perfect fall guy for John Cates’ murder been staring us in the face?

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In an interesting take on a whodunnit murder plot, General Hospital has already shown Sonny (Maurice Benard) killing John Cates (Adam J. Harrington), and yet, there’s now a mad dash to prove neither Alexis (Nancy Lee Grahn) or Kristina (Kate Mansi) is the murderer.

For Sonny’s part, after shooting Agent Cates, Michael (Chad Duell) stumbled upon the scene of the crime and quickly went to work to cover for his father, picking up shell casings and sending the kingpin to Carly (Laura Wright) so the two of them could come up with an alibi. Although Anna (Finola Hughes) and the rest of the Port Charles Police Department have largely assumed that Sonny still killed John, as new evidence surfaces, Alexis or Kristina are actually looking like the guilty party.

Ric (Rick Hearst) and Elizabeth (Rebecca Herbst) caught Alexis tossing a gun into the river on the night John was murdered, and Ric eagerly reported what he saw to authorities. Considering that Alexis was enraged with John for what he was doing to Kristina and let her frustrations be known in public, she has plenty of known motive to kill the FBI agent. Plus, with the cops not being able to find the murder weapon and hearing Alexis tossed a gun, it looks highly suspicious.

Meanwhile, as the police focus their attention on Alexis, Molly (Kristen Vaganos) focuses her attention on her sister. Molly believes Alexis is covering for Kristina in the homicide of John, and the assistant district attorney is determined to prove just that, feeling Kristina never accepts responsibility for her actions. Molly is wrong about Kristina shooting someone, of course, but Kristina did steal a gun from Sonny that Alexis subsequently got rid of thinking Kristina may do something drastic.

We’re doubtful that Sonny will just sit back and watch Alexis or Kristina go down for a crime he committed, and he likely won’t confess to what he did. Additionally, Michael is looking to pin the crime on someone to save Kristina and Alexis. We thought about all of this, and then it hit us. The perfect fall guy for John’s murder could be Scott (Kin Shriner).

The last time viewers saw Scott, he was spotting Jason (Steve Burton) as he stumbled upon the pharmacist who was messing with Sonny’s bipolar medication. Then shortly after that, Scott apparently went into hiding and the pharmacist went missing. Offscreen, Scott reached out to Ric to go to Port Charles and represent Heather (Alley Mills) in her case, but Scott still hasn't been seen.

With all that being said, Sonny, Michael or Jason could shift suspicion Scott’s way. Yes, the attorney went missing before John’s murder, but it wouldn’t be hard to paint the picture that Scott came back to town to do the deed.

Not for nothing, Scott started to think John was becoming a bit hinged when he left, so the argument could be made Scott killed John in fear for his life. Now for that motive to work, Ava (Maura West) would likely need to speak about Scott’s fear of John, which she would need convincing to do. However, considering Jason just saved her life, Ava could sell the story as a favor to him. But would she really throw her friend under the bus?

Now allow us to propose another great fall guy — the pharmacist. He was also afraid of an unhinged John, he’s missing and he’s a disposable character in terms of the General Hospital landscape. Sonny or Jason could go look for him and convince him to confess to John’s murder, promising to get him a great attorney and a light sentence. It’s worth mentioning that the pharmacist owes Sonny for his role in tampering with his medicine, so the dimpled kingpin may lure that over his head. Sonny may propose the pharmacist do this or he’ll meet a fate similar to John’s.

While this fall guy theory is just that, we have to think it may come to fruition as we can picture Sonny, Alexis or Kristina going to prison.

New episodes of General Hospital air weekdays on ABC. If you miss an episode, you can catch up on Hulu.