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If the smoke alarms worked, why didn't anyone wake up? After the fire that killed his wife and three kids, Shawn
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Stewart sued KDA, the manufacturer of the smoke alarms in the house. He claimed the alarms never went off, even
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though the official report specifically calls out an alarm upstairs. But KDA has
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faced lawsuits for alarms that don't alert early enough in smoldering fires specifically. So, check your smoke
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alarms, crime junkies. But here's where things in this case really stop adding up. There was supposed to be a smoke
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alarm near the kitchen, the area of the house that had the biggest flames. Fire experts say even an ionization alarm
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should have gone off there. But in the photos, there's no clear sign there was ever one there. Now, what are visible
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are two AA KDA branded batteries lying on the floor near the kitchen. They're not melted, just covered in soot. The
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fire expert we spoke to told us that if the alarm had melted, the batteries would have melted, too. So, it's not
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like they just fell out during the house fire. So, either someone took the batteries out and forgot to replace
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them, or someone took them out because they didn't want the alarm to go off.