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Forest Service Investigator Believes Barton Lied About Letter. The lead U.S. Forest Service investigator looking into the cause of Colorado's largest wildfire testified Tuesday that she doesn't believe a burning letter sparked the fire. Agent Kimberly Jones was testifying in a Denver federal civil case where five insurance companies and several property owners are suing the federal government for more than $7 million because a Forest Service employee was responsible. That employee, Terry Barton, was convicted of starting the 2002 Hayman wildfire and spent nearly six years in a federal prison. When Jones testified that she didn't believe there ever...

Terry Lynn Barton has been released from prison after serving a six-year term for starting the worst wildfire in Colorado's recorded history. Barton, 44, pleaded guilty to arson charges stemming from the 2002 Hayman Fire, which blackened 138,000 acres, destroyed 133 homes and forced more than 8,000 people to evacuate. She was a fire spotter for the U.S. Forest Service at the time

Barton Gets 15 Years Probation, Community Service. A woman who admitted to starting the Hayman Fire will not do any time in Colorado for sparking the largest wildfire in the state's history... "I feel good. It's done," Terry Barton said, looking relaxed at the hearing. Barton is currently serving a six-year sentence in a federal prison in Fort Worth, Texas and will be released in June. The state wanted her to also serve time in state prison, but Barton's original state sentence of 12 years in prison was overturned by the Colorado Appeals Court. "Your honor, I'm not asking for...

CRIPPLE CREEK - All Hayman fire-starter Terry Barton has to do to repay the victims of Colorado’s worst wildfire is hit the Powerball drawing. Barton, 39, a former U.S. Forest Service worker, pleaded guilty to starting the fire that burned almost 138,000 acres last summer and was ordered by a state court to pay restitution. She owes $27,552,557.11, according to a court document filed Monday. Barton’s debt was determined from reported losses of $30,561,567 minus $3,009,010.89 insurance companies paid. Private losses totaled more than $16 million in Douglas County, $13.76 million in Teller County, $660,000 in Park County and $129,000...

<p>DENVER, Colo. — The U.S. Forest Service has fired Terry Barton, the employee charged with starting the largest wildfire since Colorado became a state.</p> <p>Forest Service spokesman Lynn Young said Saturday that Barton was fired because of her "conduct." He wouldn't elaborate because the investigation is continuing into the Hayman fire, which has burned 137,000 acres, destroyed at least 133 homes and cost more than $29 million to fight.</p>

<p>Terry Barton stands at the scene of the Hayman Fire Sunday, June 9. She is now held in jail without bail.</p> <p>DENVER — The estranged husband of a U.S. Forest Service worker accused of setting the worst wildfire in Colorado history told investigators he had never written a letter to his wife, undercutting her story that she had accidently kindled the blaze by burning the letter in a campfire ring. That information came to light Thursday during a pretrial hearing for Forest Service recreation technician Terry Barton, 38, an 18-year veteran of the agency. Barton pleaded innocent in federal court to four felony counts lodged against her by a grand jury on Wednesday.</p>

June 19, 2002 Colorado Wildfire May Have Been Intentionally SetBy MICHAEL JANOFSKY ENVER, June 18 — Federal investigators have concluded that the Forest Service employee charged with starting a fire that has burned more than 100,000 acres in central Colorado set the blaze deliberately and lied when she said she had done so accidentally by burning a letter inside a campfire ring, a senior Forest Service official said today. Associated PressAt Confluence Park in Denver, high winds blew heavy smoke yesterday from the Hayman fire, 35 miles away. The official said investigators had found burned underbrush positioned in such a...

Once the blaze that is now consuming the Colorado landscape got rolling a little question popped into my mind. It almost always does when I hear of these horrible disasters. "How did it start?" I'm always interested in the origins of things. How did Hitler come to power? How did Clinton get elected twice? How does my wallet seem to empty faster than it seems to fill? You get the idea... I've often heard of those mysterious fires that just seem to begin out of nothing. I guess what happens is the conditions get so dry that one day given...