Woman found not guilty of setting fire to her house Yesterday's verdict clears the way for a federal civil suit to proceed. By HARRY YANOSHAK
A Bristol Township woman was found not guilty yesterday of setting fire to one of her three houses. Cynthia Efaw gasped and cried, her arms reaching for her two grown daughters seated in the front row, as the verdict was read. "There is a God," her oldest, Darlene Schweickert, 31, said. Not only did Bucks County Judge John Rufe find Efaw not guilty of setting the fire, he said authorities didn't prove beyond a reasonable doubt that she had been near the scene. If she had been found guilty, Efaw faced a maximum of 10 to 20 years in prison. The fire occurred Dec. 23, 1995, at 29 Cornflower Lane, Bristol Township. Following seven months of inquiries, a county grand jury in March 1997 indicted Efaw on felony charges of arson, recklessly endangering another person and insurance fraud. She was cleared of all those charges yesterday, a verdict that frees her lawyer to pursue a federal court case against State Farm Insurance. Lawyer and family friend Mel Kardos is suing State Farm for the unpaid claim on the house, about $88,000, plus "thousands more" in legal fees brought on because of the criminal proceedings, he said. The federal case couldn't proceed while the criminal case was ongoing, he said. "She has been living a nightmare," Kardos said. Volunteer firefighters found flames coming from the kitchen windows. The home's four ent-rances had been locked with deadbolts. Authorities said the source of the fire was either clothing set on fire with matches or rags left on a lit stove burner. Tom Snyder, an expert fire investigator, disputed Bristol Township's investigation, led by then-Fire Marshal Ed Copper, who's now the fire marshal in Falls. Snyder testified that a discarded cigarette caused the fire. Schweickert was renting the house from her mother and was smoking that evening. Snyder said Schweickert discarded the cigarette. Investigators failed to check all the clues, he said. "There was a serious blunder," Snyder said. "This fire was purely an accident." Kardos said the ruling marked the first time in recent memory that a case brought before a county grand jury failed to yield a guilty verdict. Prosecutor David Zellis, the county's first assistant district attorney, argued Efaw's "irrational behavior" toward her older daughter motivated the arson. Out of work at the time and with a baby to care for, Schweickert relied too heavily on her mother's finances and Efaw got tired of it, he argued. Zellis couldn't be reached later for comment. "We knew she didn't do it, and we stuck together," her younger daughter, Maureen Neely, 28, of Bristol Township, said. Her mother's face beamed. "I had lost faith in the system," Efaw said. "I'm just glad it's over. Right now we're just going to try and pick up the pieces." |