00:00:06
in the aftermath of a fatal fire
00:00:09
one question remained
00:00:11
was it an accident or was it arson
00:00:15
it took the physics of a burning
00:00:17
cigarette the chemical composition of a
00:00:19
flame and a computer simulated fire to
00:00:22
determine how the fire started
00:00:25
and who was responsible
00:00:30
[Music]
00:00:37
[Music]
00:00:54
[Music]
00:00:56
for 25 years ed and rosalie camiolo
00:00:59
lived in an affluent suburb just outside
00:01:02
of philadelphia
00:01:04
ed was a retired government worker
00:01:06
rosalie worked in the computer industry
00:01:10
their only child paul a 31 year old
00:01:12
computer programmer lived upstairs he
00:01:15
took care of his parents since they had
00:01:17
difficulty getting around
00:01:19
it's not that they were bedridden or
00:01:21
complete invalids but they certainly
00:01:23
weren't athletic and able to respond in
00:01:26
my opinion to an emergency situation
00:01:29
just before dawn in september of 1996
00:01:32
paul made an emergency call to the fire
00:01:35
department
00:01:36
what is your emergency we have a fire in
00:01:39
our living room
00:01:40
it's getting really bad get out of the
00:01:42
house where the firepower coming out
00:01:47
when police arrived they found paul on
00:01:50
the front lawn
00:01:51
getting dressed
00:01:53
paul said his mother and father had
00:01:55
gotten out through the back door
00:01:57
when the officer went to the backyard to
00:01:59
check there was an explosion
00:02:04
she found rosalie on the back porch
00:02:06
severely burned and barely conscious
00:02:08
but there was no sign of her 81 year old
00:02:11
husband ed
00:02:13
firefighters later found him inside
00:02:16
he had been unable to escape
00:02:19
the victim that was located was in a
00:02:21
rear bathroom
00:02:23
and he was in cardiac arrest at that
00:02:25
time
00:02:26
ed camiolo was pronounced dead at the
00:02:28
hospital
00:02:29
rosalie died too
00:02:31
a result of smoke inhalation
00:02:35
how horrible
00:02:37
it must have been for my uncle what he
00:02:38
went through to be burned
00:02:40
and my aunt
00:02:42
how horrible it must have been for her
00:02:44
the firemen at the scene didn't see
00:02:46
anything suspicious
00:02:48
there was a general consensus that the
00:02:50
fire was accidental in nature and most
00:02:52
probably the result of the careless
00:02:54
handling of smoking materials
00:02:56
either a cigarette or
00:02:58
a match to light the cigarettes
00:03:00
paul camiolo told investigators his
00:03:02
mother was a chain smoker and that she
00:03:04
probably started the fire accidentally
00:03:08
[Music]
00:03:09
paul said he was asleep upstairs when he
00:03:11
heard his father calling him
00:03:13
he said there was a small fire on the
00:03:15
sofa which his mother was trying to put
00:03:17
out
00:03:18
he ran to the kitchen got a pitcher of
00:03:20
water and threw it on the sofa but it
00:03:22
made the fire worse
00:03:25
he told his parents to go out the back
00:03:27
door he called 9-1-1 then he went out
00:03:29
the front door to his car he was in his
00:03:32
underwear i believe at the time
00:03:34
had his car parked out in front and had
00:03:37
a gym bag in his car and he felt he
00:03:39
could get some shorts or clothes to put
00:03:41
on what doesn't make sense to me was
00:03:44
paul's story
00:03:46
to this day i have problems with
00:03:49
what he says happened
00:03:52
this incident raised eyebrows among
00:03:54
investigators
00:03:56
he went in an entirely different
00:03:57
direction i mean i think common sense
00:04:00
dictates that you're going to make sure
00:04:02
your folks get out of the house and the
00:04:04
way to make sure that your parents get
00:04:06
out of the house is to follow them out
00:04:08
of the house
00:04:09
paul camiolo admitted his behavior was a
00:04:12
mistake but said he was dazed and
00:04:14
confused
00:04:16
you know i remember feeling
00:04:21
guilty about it because i was the
00:04:23
able-bodied one
00:04:25
and i didn't cut them out
00:04:28
but when a suspicious substance was
00:04:30
found on the living room floor
00:04:33
all eyes turned once again
00:04:36
to paul camiolo
00:04:39
[Music]
00:04:41
ed and rose camiolo were laid to rest in
00:04:44
the family plot
00:04:46
just a few miles from their home
00:04:49
the cameolos lives before the fire had
00:04:52
not been easy
00:04:54
their son paul was their primary
00:04:56
caregiver
00:04:58
you know he did have that responsibility
00:05:00
to help assist his parents
00:05:02
he would do the grocery shopping for
00:05:04
them
00:05:05
if they wanted something from a
00:05:06
department store a lot of times he would
00:05:08
go to the mall and buy it and bring it
00:05:10
home
00:05:11
investigators wondered whether paul may
00:05:14
have had something to do with setting
00:05:16
the fire
00:05:18
there was money there in the form of
00:05:19
insurance money
00:05:21
and that
00:05:22
in and of itself is a powerful motive
00:05:24
i believe received about 200 000
00:05:27
in insurance benefits
00:05:29
a second motive that some of the
00:05:31
investigators believed existed was that
00:05:34
paul cameola was tired of caring for his
00:05:36
infirmed parents
00:05:39
fire investigators searched through the
00:05:41
rubble and found something very
00:05:43
suspicious
00:05:44
[Music]
00:05:45
in the center of the room there was a
00:05:48
pattern that looked like perhaps it
00:05:50
might have been associated with a liquid
00:05:52
pour what they
00:05:53
refer to when someone might have poured
00:05:55
an accelerant
00:05:57
to see if an accelerant was used
00:05:59
investigators removed samples of the
00:06:01
carpeting the padding and the hardwood
00:06:04
floor
00:06:06
the samples were sealed in paint cans to
00:06:09
prevent any gases from escaping and sent
00:06:12
to the forensic lab
00:06:14
gas chromatography can identify the
00:06:17
molecular components of the samples and
00:06:19
the results showed there was evidence of
00:06:22
gasoline on the wood floor
00:06:28
and the single
00:06:30
biggest piece of evidence for them to
00:06:32
conclude this was an arson fire was the
00:06:34
finding of gasoline in the hardwood
00:06:36
floor
00:06:37
because how else would you explain
00:06:39
gasoline in a living room when the test
00:06:42
results come back it changes from i
00:06:43
don't know to
00:06:45
wow we have a we have an accelerant here
00:06:48
this must be an arson and that changes
00:06:49
people's opinions
00:06:50
to prosecutors
00:06:52
the presence of gasoline
00:06:54
meant murder
00:06:58
based on this evidence prosecutors
00:07:01
believe that paul poured gasoline on the
00:07:03
living room floor while his parents were
00:07:05
upstairs asleep
00:07:08
he then set the room on fire and called
00:07:11
the fire department
00:07:16
the heat and smoke made it impossible
00:07:19
for paul's parents to make it out of the
00:07:21
house alive
00:07:22
paul strongly denied these charges
00:07:26
my mother and father knew the truth and
00:07:29
god knows the truth and that's all that
00:07:31
mattered to me
00:07:34
paul camiolo was arrested and charged
00:07:36
with two counts of first degree murder
00:07:39
his request for bail was denied
00:07:42
i had no problem justifying
00:07:45
arguing for the death penalty i mean i
00:07:48
just i can't think of anything more vile
00:07:50
than killing the very people that
00:07:52
brought you into this world
00:07:54
they were saying i tried to burn them to
00:07:56
death you know i
00:07:59
that's
00:08:00
that's just
00:08:02
you know horrible beyond words
00:08:04
the press depicted him as a cold-blooded
00:08:08
killer yet his family stood firmly
00:08:10
behind him anybody that knew paul knew
00:08:13
he couldn't do anything like that
00:08:15
he loved his parents very much
00:08:17
and they were very devoted families
00:08:19
that boy was good to his parents we were
00:08:22
all there to support him and we all like
00:08:25
we all went to the hearings and
00:08:26
[Music]
00:08:27
several of us visited him on a regular
00:08:29
basis we all believed that he was
00:08:31
innocent
00:08:32
as the trial approached
00:08:34
paul camiolo and his defense team looked
00:08:37
for some way to prove that the fire was
00:08:40
an accident
00:08:42
i couldn't imagine how the gasoline got
00:08:46
in there
00:08:47
there had to be another explanation as
00:08:49
to why gasoline was in that floor
00:08:53
[Music]
00:08:54
the firemen responding to the cameolos
00:08:56
house fire were all volunteers
00:09:00
but one of them had an unusual
00:09:02
background
00:09:04
steve avata was also an agent with the
00:09:07
bureau of alcohol tobacco and firearms
00:09:10
he had been a philadelphia policeman
00:09:12
prior to going to the atf so he was not
00:09:15
somebody just out of the academy he had
00:09:17
been someone involved in police work for
00:09:19
a number of years
00:09:20
the atf took no part in this
00:09:22
investigation
00:09:24
but personally avado was dumbfounded
00:09:26
when he learned paul camiolo had been
00:09:29
charged with arson to him it just didn't
00:09:32
make sense
00:09:34
that finding shocked me uh i hadn't
00:09:36
anticipated that it seemed very
00:09:38
difficult to explain how the gasoline
00:09:40
would be in hardwood floor but not in
00:09:42
carpeting and padding above it if a
00:09:45
significant volume of gasoline was
00:09:46
poured
00:09:48
and novato wasn't the least bit
00:09:50
suspicious of paul's behavior on the
00:09:52
night of the fire
00:09:54
it's not unusual for people in a fire to
00:09:56
exit a building through the way that
00:09:58
they're most comfortable
00:10:00
exiting if they typically come and go
00:10:02
through the front door no matter where
00:10:04
they are in the house they'll exit
00:10:05
through the front door
00:10:07
avato told local investigators that he
00:10:09
believed the fire was accidental and he
00:10:12
was roundly dismissed
00:10:14
they portrayed him in the media that he
00:10:17
was you know an apprentice fire
00:10:19
investigator that really was not
00:10:21
experienced and really didn't have the
00:10:23
qualifications to be offering opinions
00:10:25
he was treated like dirt
00:10:29
by the locals and by the attorneys
00:10:32
involved in this case
00:10:34
when the defense team learned about
00:10:36
steve avato's opinion that the fire was
00:10:38
an accident
00:10:40
they conducted their own investigation
00:10:42
and hired dr rick roby an expert on the
00:10:46
science of fires
00:10:48
what makes it difficult is fires burn up
00:10:51
a lot of the evidence
00:10:53
roby studies fires while they're burning
00:10:57
to do this he sets fires like this one
00:11:00
in model rooms
00:11:02
fires progress differently depending on
00:11:04
how they're set the size of the room air
00:11:07
flow and hundreds of other
00:11:08
considerations
00:11:11
all of this data is then entered into a
00:11:13
computer
00:11:15
it's a fully 3d
00:11:17
fire modeling software that actually
00:11:19
allows you to model the development and
00:11:21
growth of a fire in a building
00:11:24
for this assignment roby and his staff
00:11:26
built a virtual reality replica of the
00:11:29
cameolo home
00:11:31
then they entered all known information
00:11:33
about the fire into the computer
00:11:37
roby conservatively estimated that it
00:11:40
would take at least one gallon of
00:11:42
gasoline to create a poor pattern the
00:11:45
size of the one found in the living room
00:11:49
five or six minutes after paul camiolo
00:11:51
called the fire department the outside
00:11:54
window exploded
00:11:56
the explosion was the result of what is
00:11:58
called flashover
00:12:02
when flashover occurs
00:12:04
temperatures in the room get so high
00:12:06
that items ignite even without coming
00:12:09
into contact with the flame as you can
00:12:11
see here
00:12:13
and in fact unfortunately there are
00:12:15
firefighters killed every year
00:12:17
by having been caught in flashover
00:12:19
conditions because it happens so rapidly
00:12:22
sometimes it's very difficult to escape
00:12:24
from those conditions
00:12:26
after roby entered this information into
00:12:28
his computer program
00:12:30
he lit a virtual match
00:12:33
within 30 seconds hot gas fills the room
00:12:37
within one minute smoke and gas spread
00:12:40
up the stairs to the second floor
00:12:43
and three minutes after ignition the
00:12:45
living room would reach flashover
00:12:47
blowing out the window
00:12:49
the entire room becomes engulfed in
00:12:51
flames because there's so much burning
00:12:54
and so much hot gas that it's completely
00:12:56
uninhabitable
00:12:58
[Music]
00:13:01
but the police witnessed the window
00:13:03
breaking five or six minutes after paul
00:13:05
called the fire department
00:13:07
to robie this meant that gasoline
00:13:10
couldn't have been used to start the
00:13:12
fire
00:13:13
he would have had a tough time actually
00:13:14
getting to the front door without being
00:13:17
engulfed in flames that's one of the
00:13:19
things our model showed so we look at
00:13:21
the arson scenario and there's
00:13:22
inconsistency after inconsistency
00:13:25
next roby tested paul camiolo's story
00:13:29
paul said the fire started by accident
00:13:32
with a cigarette or a match his mother
00:13:34
had been using
00:13:36
at one minute
00:13:37
the fire would be about two feet tall
00:13:40
and gathering strength
00:13:42
at two minutes it would be moving across
00:13:44
the ceiling
00:13:45
at four minutes temperatures and gas
00:13:47
levels in the room would be fatal
00:13:50
at five and a half minutes the fire
00:13:52
reaches flashover and the window blows
00:13:55
out
00:13:56
[Music]
00:13:58
this was consistent with paul camiolo's
00:14:00
version of events
00:14:02
matches up with everything that paul
00:14:04
camiolo is saying and with other
00:14:06
objective evidence that he has nothing
00:14:08
to do with
00:14:10
but important questions remained
00:14:13
if the fire was an accident
00:14:16
why was gasoline found on the living
00:14:19
room floor
00:14:24
i was horrified it felt like
00:14:27
i was in my own horror film
00:14:31
defense attorney thomas kameta strongly
00:14:34
believed his client paul camiolo was
00:14:37
innocent that he never set fire to his
00:14:39
family's home in order to kill his
00:14:42
parents
00:14:43
facing the death penalty for a crime
00:14:45
that he was convinced and we were
00:14:47
convinced
00:14:48
first of all didn't he did not commit
00:14:50
but a crime that didn't occur that this
00:14:51
was an accidental fire
00:14:53
so yeah there were high stakes in this
00:14:55
case there's no doubt about that the
00:14:58
reason paul camilo had been charged with
00:15:00
first degree murder was the gasoline
00:15:03
found on the wood floors in the living
00:15:05
room
00:15:07
but paul's defense team
00:15:09
was suspicious of this finding they took
00:15:12
samples of the carpeting the carpet
00:15:15
padding and some newspaper and there was
00:15:17
no gasoline in any of those samples it
00:15:20
was only in the hardwood floor
00:15:22
and it was just inconceivable how can
00:15:24
you pour gasoline in a family room and
00:15:28
not get the gas on those other items if
00:15:30
that was going to be the cause of the
00:15:32
fire
00:15:33
so the defense team hired john lentini a
00:15:37
nationally recognized fire expert to
00:15:39
find out
00:15:40
what happened
00:15:42
[Music]
00:15:44
lentini retested the samples of hardwood
00:15:47
floor using atomic absorption
00:15:49
spectroscopy
00:15:52
it's a way to measure the concentration
00:15:54
of metals in a solution
00:15:56
the wood flooring was dissolved in acid
00:16:00
then analyzed to see how the solution is
00:16:03
absorbed through the flame
00:16:05
the amount of light absorbed is
00:16:07
proportional to the concentration of the
00:16:10
element in the solution
00:16:12
and what was the element found in the
00:16:15
solution
00:16:17
lead
00:16:18
this meant that it was leaded gasoline
00:16:22
on the cameolo's wood floors
00:16:24
but how did this happen
00:16:26
since leaded gasoline hadn't been sold
00:16:28
in this country for over 15 years
00:16:32
many of the
00:16:33
poorly constructed houses that i've
00:16:34
looked at were built in the early 70s
00:16:36
and they were built by contractors who
00:16:38
were cutting corners
00:16:40
flooring contractors often used gasoline
00:16:43
as a thinner so the varnish would go
00:16:45
onto the wooden floors more easily
00:16:48
this was cheaper than using high quality
00:16:51
thinners
00:16:52
no one refuted the fact that that was a
00:16:54
common practice that they did use gas in
00:16:57
finishing of the hardwood floors so i'm
00:16:59
convinced that's where that gas came
00:17:01
from
00:17:02
so that was really the moment where he
00:17:04
said here's the final piece of the
00:17:05
puzzle if this is leaded gasoline it all
00:17:07
makes sense and it makes sense that it
00:17:09
would be there and why
00:17:11
forensic tests also revealed
00:17:14
how the fire started
00:17:16
a cigarette dropped onto a polyurethane
00:17:19
sofa will simply smolder
00:17:24
but when a match is dropped on the same
00:17:25
material it's almost like an explosion
00:17:31
and tests revealed that another aspect
00:17:34
of paul's story was correct
00:17:36
that when he poured water on the fire it
00:17:39
got worse
00:17:41
the average person wouldn't know that
00:17:43
polyurethane melts and then when you
00:17:44
throw water on it it actually flares up
00:17:46
like a grease fire
00:17:48
when prosecutors heard about this to
00:17:50
their credit they conducted their own
00:17:52
test
00:17:53
they secured from the manufacturer the
00:17:55
same fabric that was on the camiolo sofa
00:18:00
and i cut off a four inch by four inch
00:18:02
portion of this fabric
00:18:05
and we dropped the match on it
00:18:07
and it ignited immediately
00:18:10
and at that point i knew that the case
00:18:12
was in trouble
00:18:13
serious trouble
00:18:15
and the alleged poor pattern on the
00:18:17
living room floor
00:18:20
many now believe
00:18:22
it was simply the result of normal wear
00:18:24
and tear
00:18:26
you would expect that people walking
00:18:27
back and forth on the carpet would thin
00:18:29
the carpet and therefore any heat that's
00:18:31
imparted on that would pass through that
00:18:33
carpet area more quickly than in other
00:18:36
areas
00:18:37
when all of this overwhelming body of
00:18:39
evidence came to light
00:18:41
all charges against paul camiolo were
00:18:44
dropped
00:18:45
in this business you have people that
00:18:47
for a certain amount of money will tell
00:18:49
you anything you want to hear
00:18:51
these experts where not of that ilk and
00:18:54
no it wasn't tough it wasn't a sad day
00:18:58
it was the right thing to do and if it's
00:18:59
the right thing to do then do it
00:19:01
and i'm not saying that it was malicious
00:19:03
and intentional i'm saying that
00:19:05
unfortunately they had gut feelings and
00:19:08
years of practical experience that led
00:19:11
them to conclude this had to be an arson
00:19:13
fire so they let
00:19:15
common perceptions outweigh
00:19:18
logic and science and luckily logic and
00:19:20
science prevailed in this case
00:19:24
paul spent 10 months in jail
00:19:26
facing a possible death sentence for a
00:19:29
crime that never happened
00:19:32
there there are days i can't bear to
00:19:34
look at pictures of my mother and father
00:19:38
because i
00:19:39
i just remember the fire
00:19:42
and
00:19:43
there
00:19:44
are other days that
00:19:45
you know once you've been in
00:19:47
jail yummy field at times you have a
00:19:50
scarlet ladder
00:19:53
he spent 10 months in jail he'll never
00:19:55
get that time back that was liberty that
00:19:57
was taken away from him that he'll never
00:19:58
get back it was a time that he should
00:20:01
have been grieving for the loss of his
00:20:02
parents and instead he was fighting for
00:20:04
his own life
00:20:06
john lentini says
00:20:08
fire investigation still has a long way
00:20:11
to go before its application is as
00:20:13
dependable as other forensic sciences
00:20:17
it's a matter of a profession that is
00:20:19
largely controlled and dominated by
00:20:21
hacks
00:20:23
and these people didn't set out to
00:20:24
become hacks but they don't know what
00:20:25
they're doing they're making complicated
00:20:27
decisions about chemistry and physics
00:20:30
and they never took chemistry in physics
00:20:31
[Music]
00:20:33
when asked how it felt to be right all
00:20:35
along not surprisingly steve avato had
00:20:39
no comment
00:20:40
but his colleagues spoke for him
00:20:43
his courage was was later
00:20:45
recognized by his fellow fire
00:20:48
investigators when the international
00:20:50
association of arson investigators named
00:20:52
him investigator of the year
00:20:54
for standing up to the enormous peer
00:20:57
pressure
00:20:58
that came down on him when he said wait
00:21:00
a minute guys i don't think we've really
00:21:01
got an arson here
00:21:04
[Music]
00:21:26
[Applause]
00:21:32
[Music]
00:21:41
you
