More than 700 buildings burned. Over 65,000 people were evacuated. More than 6,000 acres of eastern Washington went up in flames. And before investigators had even finished their first walk-through, the usual chorus was already singing: climate change.
Then the cops found the guy with the matches.
Aaron Farinacci, 37, was arrested Monday and charged with first-degree arson in connection with the Old Trails fire in Spokane, Washington. His bond was set at $1 million. According to Sheriff Nowels, who held a Monday evening news conference, "fire investigators reported that the Old Trails fire appeared to be intentionally set using a match or a butane lighter to ignite grass."
Farinacci was carrying waterproof matches and a butane lighter when he was taken into custody.
That alone would be a significant story — the fire that devastated Spokane wasn't a consequence of rising global temperatures but allegedly the work of one man and a lighter. But Farinacci's background turns a significant story into a staggering one.
In 2010, Farinacci shot and killed his own father, Jeffrey Farinacci, in an incident investigated by Mesa Police. He was originally charged with first-degree murder. By 2012, he'd pleaded guilty in Arizona to the reduced charges of manslaughter and aggravated assault. By 2020, he was back on the street.
Three separate fires hit the Spokane area — the Old Trails fire, the Autumn Lane fire, and the Fairview fire. Farinacci has been charged in connection with the Old Trails blaze. The investigation into the other fires is ongoing.
The climate-change-as-default-explanation playbook has become reflexive. A fire breaks out, and before anyone asks who, how, or why, the answer is already loaded: fossil fuels, carbon emissions, insufficient government spending on green energy. The assumption travels faster than the investigation. And when the investigation catches up, the correction never gets the same volume as the accusation.
65,000 people didn't lose their homes because the planet is half a degree warmer than it was in 1990. They lost their homes because a convicted killer who served eight years for manslaughter was walking around Spokane with waterproof matches and a butane lighter.
He killed his father. He was released in 2020. By 2026, 700 buildings were on fire.
That's not a climate problem. That's a sentencing one.