Posted on 02/15/2002 1:35:24 PM PST by weegee
The first firefighters at a fiery car wreck Sunday in Fayette County that killed a Memphis driver's license examiner thought it was suspicious even as they put out the flames. Investigators began an immediate search for a device that might have triggered the intense fire, said the chief of the Piperton Fire Department.
The fire killed Katherine Smith, the examiner at the center of a federal investigation of an alleged scheme to issue driver's licenses fraudulently to men with Middle Eastern ties.
Smith died one day before she was due to appear before a federal magistrate judge for a detention hearing on the conspiracy charge. She was released on her own recognizance, but her five co-defendants have been in custody since their arrests Feb. 5.
Piperton Fire Chief Steve Kellett said he, other firefighters and Tennessee Highway Patrol officers immediately thought the fire was suspicious. For one thing, the fire appeared to have started in the rear.
"The thing that was strange about it was how high up in the car it was. Normally, if it's from a gas line, it tends to burn up everything and works from the front to the back," Kellett said Thursday.
His description is consistent with testimony Wednesday by FBI agent J. Suzanne Nash before Magistrate Judge J. Daniel Breen. Nash said a group of six witnesses saw a fire in the back seat of Smith's car as the 1992 Acura Legend veered off a stretch of U.S. 72 shortly before 1 a.m. The car crossed a ditch and landed against a utility pole.
"There was lots of damage for the amount of time it was on fire," Kellett said, noting that the fire also spread to the pole. "We would spray an area that normally would go out, but it would keep catching back. That gives you a feeling that there was something there."
Highway Patrol investigators did not find an incendiary device in the car that night, Kellett said, ". . . but they were looking for one."
The Piperton department is trained in fighting arson and spotting signs of accelerants - substances used to start and direct the path of fires. "We've had a lot of training. We've seen what accelerated fires can do," Kellett said.
In 1996, he investigated a similar vehicle fire. In that case, a truck was burned with a device that used a milk jug filled with gasoline.
Nash testified Wednesday that Smith's clothing had gasoline on it and that a dog trained to detect the presence of accelerants indicated such substances were in the car.
Samples of those materials are being tested, she said. She also said the fire was set but did not say how or who may have done it.
Kellett said two "bubble spots" on the back of the trunk indicate arson. "Something was pushing the fire. It was focusing it in a direction."
The other avenue of speculation is "was she unconscious and dowsed with gasoline"? If the fireball is quick enough, this does not need to be the case. I talked briefly with a friend of mine who says that she's been told that she would've died in her car fire if someone hadn't pulled her out (as it was she got considerable scarring on her hands and arms that she still has 20 years later).
That's a pretty lame theory. What was she doing about 40 miles from home late at night on the road? Maybe meeting with the Dixie Mafia for instructions?
I see that NY Times is running the story (don't know about NY Post). Is this story getting national play (a name search on the people who were arrested primarily turned up recent articles about the arrest) and there were only about 5 or 6 papers running the story online (from that search).
I said the same without as many words.
So, do you like 1) the stripped-down bare essentials, 2) a fluff-filled piece, 3) a detailed one (PhilDragoo was detailed BTW) or 4) a really juicy conspiracy theory?
I am going to hazard a guess that you A) failed read any of the previous give and take in this thread, or B) failed to read any of the previous give and take for content - in which I *did* converge on 'a theory'.
I guess my real error is not CNN-izing it enough to your taste and satisfaction ...
Where was she going or coming from?
I have not see either discussed.
It also works, doesn't reek of complicated conspiracy aspects (that's why YOU seem to object) AND -
- it is most likely what happened.
End of story.
Then maybe _jim is a BLOND!
Wonder if she had family there?
Someone on another thread said it was in the same county...
All I want to know is what makes you assume a grown woman would roll her window down as she's being flagged down in the middle of the night.
"Uniforms",......police, fire, or emergency.
:-(
If you used the remote control circuit of a c.d. changer, to maybe set off a model rocket ignitor that is inside some kind of gas/black powder device. The small powder charge makes sure the gas disperses somewhat before ignition.
Obviously, whoever did this don't care if the F.B.I. knows what they used. Kinda crude but flamboyant way to take someone out.
To the previous poster who said this looks like the dixie mafia, let me just say that people found shot to death in Atlanta who just happen to have "crack" on their persons don't get much investigation time.
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