Special Agent Terry Kearns
Appearances
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
We needed help.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
They would sit in the preserve overnight with night vision goggles and all that.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
Our joke with the fire department was that they wash all the evidence away because what do you do? You put the wet stuff on the red stuff, right?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
We set up a 1-800 hotline so that people could call in if they had tips of anything that they thought might be helpful.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
We had a lot of phone calls with leads coming in. I think we had thousands.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
Some of them you look at more seriously and some you can rule out right away.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
We would rather somebody call something in and go run it out and it be nothing than to not be that call and it was the one call that might give us the break that we needed.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
In my career, just over 20 years, there was probably only one or two times I had a case where there wasn't a skeleton in the closet.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
You can't just go down one rabbit hole. You kind of have to try to look at as many possibilities as you can.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
As soon as we'd have surveillance on a mile area, an arson would happen just outside of that surveillance area.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
We would expand the surveillance area, and arson would happen just outside, to the point where we really started wondering, is there a leak?
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
I had been out to dinner with some friends and was driving home. It was dark, and the windows were up because it was cold. And I think it must have just come in through the vents. And I smelled that smell of something burning, and I freaked out.
The Binge Crimes: Finding Mom's Killer
The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors
And I'm like, there's another arson. Where is this at? You know, why haven't we got a call? I think he thought I lost it. He's like, calm down. We haven't got any calls. Just that smell triggered those arson sites. You really put your life into cases like this.