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American Morning

Long Time Forest Service Employee Started Wildfire

Aired June 17, 2002 - 07:02   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
BILL HEMMER, CNN ANCHOR: "Up Front" this morning, we go out west, where an employee of the U.S. Forest Service, who was supposed to be preventing fire, is now under arrest for starting the biggest one of all in that state. Authorities say Colorado's largest fire ever already burning well over 100,000 acres is still burning, and was started by a long-time forestry technician.

Rusty Dornin live in Denver tracking the very latest on what some consider a very ironic twist in this -- Rusty, good morning.

RUSTY DORNIN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, good morning, Bill. Shocked, stunned, angry, the emotions run the gamut for most Coloradoans, but I think the overriding one, of course, is disbelief. Disbelief that anyone who has been working here for 18 years during the summer to protect the forest here in Colorado would actually be responsible for setting this fire.

But indeed, 38-year-old Terry Barton, who was actually on patrol and who originally did report this fire. She had said that she had been driving by and discovered that this campfire had gotten away. She tried to get it under control.

It was only after investigators saw inconsistencies in her story that they were able to get her to confess that she actually did start the fire, and the way that she did it was that she had been angry at her estranged husband, who had written her a letter. She burned the letter, threw the letter into the campfire ring and saw it go out and then drove off, and apparently a little later on discovered that that had indeed started the fire.

But for most Coloradoans who have learned that it was a Forest employee, there is not much empathy for her emotional state.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They want to lynch her. They want to string her up and lynch her.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, it's aggravating, real aggravating to know that it is somebody from this area and in that profession.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Somebody made a mistake. Somebody wasn't thinking. It sounds like they were personal papers. It was -- under a little bit of stress or something and just wasn't thinking. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lot of angry individuals. You know, it's sick, and especially the fact that she is part of the Forest Service makes it even worse.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

DORNIN: Well, Barton will make her initial appearance at federal court here in Denver today. She could face up to 15 years in prison and a half a million dollar fine -- Bill.

HEMMER: Rusty, you touched on it, just to be clear here. Did she turn herself in? Or did the investigation with this questioning just get closer and closer to the source?

DORNIN: They kept coming back to it, Bill, because they saw inconsistency. And she said that she had smelled smoke, which she was driving by in her truck, and the investigators kept facing her with, well, the wind wasn't blowing in the right direction. That couldn't really have happened that way. So apparently, her story began to fall apart, and from there, she ended up just confessing to the entire thing.

HEMMER: Rusty, thanks -- Rusty Dornin live this morning where it is very early in Denver, Colorado.

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