06x06 - Fire Dot Com

[bunniefuu]

Narrator: in , a fire broke out

In a rental home in north carolina.

Woman: brittany! Joshua!

Narrator: one child d*ed,

Another was critically injured.

To the family, the fire was a mystery.

To investigators, it was m*rder.

Narrator: tabor city, north carolina:

A small, rural, sweet potato farming community

In the western part of the state and home to the hinson family.

Woman: joshua's first christmas.

Merry christmas, buddy.

Narrator: joshua hinson and his sister brittany

Lived with their mother terri

And her boyfriend rodney strickland.

Rodney worked in construction.

Terri was a homemaker and student.

On october , ,

Rodney left to spend the night with his son

In fair bluff, about miles away.

Terri's mother bernice came over to the house that night for dinner.

I was there when she took brittany and josh upstairs to bed.

And as they were going upstairs to bed,

The last words I heard josh say is "I love you,"

Because he was just learning to talk.

Narrator: after bernice left,

Terri plugged in a space heater to heat the home

Since it was the first cold night of fall.

She fell asleep on the sofa in the living room around midnight.

At a.m., Terri was awakened by screams from her children.

The house was on fire.

Joshua. Brittany!

Narrator: the thick smoke and flames made it impossible to reach the children.

The only thing terri could do was call the fire department.

.

Narrator: the police arrived first,

And an officer also tried to rescue the children.

He, too, was unsuccessful.

Woman: he went kind of past me

And got almost to the top of the stairway and said, "we can't get in."

[Policeman coughs]

Narrator: to clear the way, terri moved the space heater at the bottom of the stairs.

By the time firemen arrived,

The upstairs was almost entirely in flames.

The children were rushed to the hospital, both in critical condition.

Woman: it was really hard to recognize her as brittany.

She was black from head to toe.

And they told me when I got there that she'd make it.

Narrator: brittany was fortunate. She survived the fire.

Tragically, -month-old joshua did not.

Woman: they finally came out and said that he didn't make it.

They did ask me if I wanted to see him.

They suggested I didn't, but that I could--

That, you know, they had to ask.

And, uh...i didn't.

Yeah, I really loved him a lot.

I really loved him like, like he was my actual child.

I loved him like that.

I wanted my baby brother to at least have a long life

Because he was--he hardly even had a life.

He was too young to die.

Narrator: when the fire was extinguished,

Local authorities found evidence

That the fire started in the children's bedroom closet.

At first, they thought that brittany might have been playing with matches,

But when they looked into terri hinson's background,

They uncovered information which made them suspect

It might have been m*rder.

Narrator: brittany hinson, now years old,

Remembers the horrible fire

That b*rned through her home years earlier.

Brittany: I was burnt all over, and I had d*ed.

And I was up in heaven, and believe me, it's beautiful.

And the rivers were rainbow-- paths and bridges...were gold,

And the houses were made out of clouds

Which had the names on top that were--of the people that would own them.

I was special because I had d*ed, and I came back alive.

That's why I think I'm special.

Narrator: her younger brother joshua, just months old,

d*ed in the fire.

Brittany: I just miss him a lot.

I wish he hadn't d*ed.

I mean, he was so young!

Narrator: with any kind of house fire,

Officials try to identify the cause.

Generally, a fire burns longest at or near its point of origin,

So the room with the most damage

Is usually where the fire started.

Most of the damage was in joshua's bedroom,

Which was at the top of the stairs.

Investigators found a v-shaped pattern

On the wall in joshua's bedroom closet.

It's a pattern that occurs when something combustible is against a wall.

This discovery told investigators

That the fire started on the closet floor

And traveled up to the attic.

A melted copper electrical wire was hanging from the attic,

Which investigators concluded had been b*rned in the fire and was not the cause of it.

Special agents from the north carolina

State bureau of investigation

And the federal bureau of alcohol, tobacco, and firearms assisted in the investigation.

They eliminated the nearby electrical outlet as the cause.

And when they couldn't determine how the fire started,

They concluded that someone had set it intentionally with a match or lighter.

Terri: I was told by the state agent

That anyone who was in the house that night was a suspect.

Anyone who had been in the house that evening would have been.

Narrator: investigators first talked to brittany

To see if she had been playing with matches that night.

They were satisfied she had not.

Next, they wanted to know where terri's boyfriend rodney was at the time of the fire.

Woman: rodney had plenty of alibis.

He was back in fair bluff with his son spending the night.

Plenty of people saw him.

Narrator: but investigators were most suspicious of terri,

Since she was sleeping on the sofa downstairs when the fire broke out

Instead of in her bedroom upstairs.

And they also discovered that a few years earlier,

She had given older children up for adoption.

Bernice: the only reason terri let those children go

Was because she did love 'em enough to want the best for 'em.

And at that time, she could not give them anything--

Not even a home.

She didn't have a job. She didn't have a car.

She didn't have no money. She didn't have anything.

People made a leap from that event, the adoptions,

To somehow that becoming a motive for k*lling her other child.

Narrator: witnesses also told police that at the fire scene terri behaved suspiciously.

Woman: her mama said that she had been depressed--

Said she had been bringing books over for her to read at night.

And her boyfriend said that she would sleep on the couch.

They just didn't think terri was acting the way

A mother would act if their--

If a child had been k*lled in a fire.

There was just something wrong to them about it.

Brittany: she was blamed for the fire.

She was blamed that she's the one who did the fire.

She didn't do it. She didn't do a single thing.

Narrator: terri denied having anything to do with setting the fire.

Terri: I was actually the only one considered.

They had to eliminate brittany, because she was a child

That couldn't start a fire at that age.

Rodney couldn't be considered because he wasn't there.

He was..., Miles away.

Narrator: police arrested terri hinson and charged her

With m*rder, attempted m*rder, and arson.

And her nightmare continued when her own lawyer hired an independent investigator

Who agreed with the prosecution

That the fire had been intentionally set.

Terri: I mean, it took me a long time to realize

My attorney wasn't going to help me.

I still held a lot of faith that he was going to do something.

And I finally realized, "ok, he's not."

Narrator: if convicted, terri could face the death penalty.

Narrator: for days,

Terri hinson sat in a north carolina jail cell

Waiting to be tried for m*rder and arson.

Eventually, terri was released on a $, bond

But remained under house arrest.

And with no one else to turn to,

Terri conducted her own research into the fire

That k*lled her son joshua.

First, with her computer,

She made a search on the internet.

She typed in the word "fire."

Terri: I spent several days, probably weeks,

Looking on the internet for something that would help my case.

I didn't understand the internet as far as there being

Actually people out there that you could talk to.

I wasn't sure of how to talk to them if I did know.

Narrator: it was slow going until terri found an article

Written by a fire investigator in sydney, australia.

Terri: [span tts:fontstyle="italic"]is it an accidental fire[/span] [span tts:fontstyle="italic"] or arson?[/Span]by tony cafe.

Narrator: the article described common mistakes

Investigators make when determining the cause

Of a suspicious fire.

Specifically, it discussed the role of bias

In fire investigation.

For example, arson investigators tend to look for arson,

And insurance investigators tend to look for insurance fraud.

The article recommends that fire investigators

Have a scientific or chemical background.

Terri desperately wanted to get in touch with the author.

Terri: I didn't understand e-mail.

When I saw the little envelope thing on his page,

I clicked on it and it's, you know, like, a blank page pops up for you to type in.

So I just assumed, ok, well, I could send this to him,

And I still didn't understand how he would get back to me.

Narrator: the author, tony cafe, did respond.

But since he lived in australia, he recommended dr. Gerald hurst

In austin, texas.

Dr. Hurst earned his ph.d. In chemistry from cambridge,

And he agreed to look into terri's case.

Man: homeowners burning a house down to k*ll their children--pretty rare.

Very rare.

Narrator: terri sent dr. Hurst every piece of information

She had about the fire.

After reading through it,

Dr. Hurst was struck by how incomplete the local investigation had been.

Hurst: I decided to concentrate on the attic

Precisely because they had said almost nothing about the attic in the investigation report.

And the attic was a complete revelation.

Narrator: the insulation in the attic was made

Of ground-up newspaper treated with a flame-retardant chemical.

Dr. Hurst checked local weather conditions,

And he discovered that hurricane fran

Had passed through tabor city, north carolina,

Just weeks before the fire.

Terri said the torrential rains from that hurricane

Leaked through the roof and caused water damage in the ceilings.

Dr. Hurst also found a melted -year-old electrical wire in the attic insulation.

Terri told hurst there had been some electrical problems

On the night of the fire.

Her curling iron had been going on and off earlier that evening,

And when she moved the electric space heater for the firemen,

She remembers it was cold to the touch.

Terri: I picked it up with both hands

And just slid it out of the way.

And later's when it dawned on me that that heater should have been very hot.

I mean, it had been turned on...

Full blast.

That meant that the heater had gone off

At least a half an hour before she became aware of the fire.

Narrator: dr. Hurst and fire investigator ken gibson

Flew to north carolina to inspect terri's home firsthand.

They did not believe the fire started

The way the government investigators said.

Well, it's really very simple:

Innocent people are being put into prison

Or forced into plea bargains for fires they did not start.

Narrator: after terri hinson was charged with arson and m*rder

In the death of her -month-old son joshua,

Her only hope was a scientist she found through the internet.

Saker: gerry hurst is one of these guys

Who kind of comes out of left field

And actually saved the day in this case.

Narrator: the findings of the state bureau of investigation

And the bureau of alcohol, tobacco, and firearms

Rested on the theory that the fire started

On the floor of the bedroom closet.

And when the cause couldn't be found,

They concluded the fire had been deliberately set.

Man: a.t.f., They call themselves arson investigators.

The state call themselves arson investigators.

That's what they're looking for, is arson.

That's what they train for; it's what they go to school for,

Is to catch arsonists.

What you want is a fire investigator

To determine what caused the fire.

Narrator: dr. Hurst found evidence

That the roof leaked in terri's rented home,

And tests revealed it washed away

The flame-retardant chemicals on the paper insulation.

He also found evidence of electrical malfunctioning

On the day of the fire.

Mysteriously, terri's curling iron was going on and off.

And during the fire, when terri moved the space heater,

It was cold to the touch.

This indicated the heater had not been on for at least a half hour before the fire.

The heater was plugged into a line originally designed for amps.

In the fuse box was a -amp fuse which had blown out.

Gibson: that means that you're carrying more power

Through that wire than it was designed to carry.

And when you overload it, it heats, it gets hot.

Cold snap;

A ,-watt appliance on a line that'd probably never seen that high a wattage before.

And the question became: did that electrical line

Over the top of the closet feed the heater?

Because if it did, you had a correlation.

You had a potential cause-and-effect situation.

Narrator: and that is exactly what he found.

The cable in the attic fed the outlet used

By the ,-watt space heater and the curling iron.

Hurst: and that's what really frosted the cake for us.

We had an origin--

A cause that could not be disproven scientifically,

And we had a connection between the differences in what was done that night

And what had been done before.

And that gives you a very strong presumptive case

For an accidental fire.

Narrator: dr. Hurst believes several factors

Created the chain of events

That culminated with the fatal fire.

Water from the leaking roof

Washed the flame-retardant chemicals off of the paper insulation in the attic

And further eroded the -year-old electrical cable.

Over time, as the rainwater hit

The exposed portion of the electrical cable,

It arced, burning the wooden attic beam

And leaving behind char marks or carbon tracks.

Wood does not conduct electricity, but carbon does.

Dr. Hurst believes that when terri plugged in

The ,-watt space heater that night,

It heated the electrical wires in the attic, which arced.

Those sparks touched a carbon track

Which ignited the paper insulation

Just above joshua's bedroom closet.

Hurst: a wooden ceiling, with an already well-built fire that suddenly breaks through,

Produces a holocaust in no time at all.

Narrator: the fiery debris from the attic

Fell through the hole in the ceiling

Onto the floor of the closet

And did not start on the floor and burn upwards

As local investigators suspected.

Ken gibson believes that the fire officials rushed to judgment.

Gibson: so anything that doesn't fall into the theory

That this was part of how the arsonist started the fire,

To them it's not evidence.

It's just something that's there.

Narrator: dr. Hurst sent the local prosecutor

His critique of the government's investigation,

Which said their conclusions were based on junk science.

Hurst: not only is there a badly melted and arced wire--

It had arc marks on it which could have been caused by the fire

But which could also have initiated the fire--

No way to tell.

And that wire passed across dead center in the hole in the ceiling.

Quite a coincidence.

Narrator: to his credit,

The district attorney studied dr. Hurst's report,

Conducted his own investigation,

And dropped the charges against terri hinson.

But by the time it was all over, she had lost her home,

Her child, and nearly her freedom

Because of an inaccurate conclusion

Drawn from faulty science.

Hurst: fire investigation, in general, is the swamp of forensic science.

In fact, many forensic scientists refuse to recognize

Arson investigation as a subfield of forensic science.

I think terri's story, in many respects, is heroic.

She was not a very well-educated woman,

Although she's extremely intelligent,

And she had just enough computer studies at her community college

To know that if she was going to be under house arrest,

She needed some way where she could put herself out into the world,

Even if it was only through her computer and e-mail.

There's people sitting in prison that have gone through

What I've gone through, but they didn't have the help,

They didn't know how to get it-- didn't have the money.

Um...and that's not fair.

Narrator: terri hinson cherishes her freedom

And the time she spends with brittany.

Yet terri thinks of joshua every day--

What he would have looked like,

What kind of person he'd be,

Remembering the good times.

I look around, and I see him everywhere.

We ran, and we played, and we had the dog to play with.

He swang out of this tree...

It's not fair.

[Sobbing]