Bitter Harvest: A Woman's Fury, a Mother's Sacrifice (47 page)

Fire, fanned by a fierce Kansas wind, engulfed Mike and Debora’s house on Canterbury Court the night of October 23–24, 1995.

Debora escaped the raging inferno through the glass door from the master bedroom to the outside deck.

Lissa climbed out of her third-story bedroom window, scrambled across the garage roof, and, at her mother’s command, jumped toward Debora’s outstretched arms. Unfortunately, Debora failed to catch her.

The third floor where the children slept was totally destroyed. Kelly and Boomer were asphyxiated in her room before the fire reached them. Tim’s badly burned body was found in the charred ruins of the house.

The massive stone entryway was virtually all that remained of the front of the house. Firefighters and police investigators immediately suspected arson because the destruction was so great.

Avon, the sniffer dog, trained to detect accelerants

Johnson County Court House Square in Olathe, Kansas, where reporters and other observers flocked in January 1996 to watch an incredible case unfold

District Attorney Paul Morrison of Johnson County thought he had already prosecuted his most sensational case—until he met Dr. Mike Farrar and Dr. Debora Green.

Assistant District Attorney Rick Guinn joined Paul Morrison in investigating the tragic deaths of Tim and Lissa Farrar and the fire that destroyed their home.

Jeff Hudson, the fire marshal of Shawnee, Kansas, drew a floor plan of Mike and Debora’s house to show where the fire had started and how it had spread.

Attorney Ellen Ryan had no idea what a complicated series of tragedies she would encounter when she agreed to represent Debora in her divorce.

Detective Rod Smith of the Prairie Village Police Department interviewed Debora and Mike in the earlymorning hours after the fire when they learned that two of their children were dead. Was it a tragic accident, or arson and murder?