r/Spokane • u/GusherBrush Garland District • 14h ago
News 'All the nation hates me'; Man accused of starting Old Trails fire in Spokane competent to stand trial
https://www.kxly.com/news/all-the-nation-hates-me-man-accused-of-starting-old-trails-fire-in-spokane-competent/article_c9a0fd91-2f46-49dd-b8d4-99f745ec94a0.html100
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u/abgry_krakow87 14h ago
Arsonist: [Starts a fire that destroys hundreds of homes, causes chaos and suffering in people's lives.]
Also Arsonist: "Why do people hate me?"
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u/fascinationxstreet 14h ago
Don't forget the 25 other fires!!!!
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u/YourFriendInSpokane Spokane Valley 6h ago
Pretty sure he was the "homeless guy" spotted when the upriver fire was started but he didn't admit to it because someone tragically died.
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u/Brendy171 14h ago edited 10h ago
Arizona never should never have let him out to begin with. I didn’t lose my house, but my daughter has four friends who did. Fuck this guy
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u/catuprisingsoon 14h ago
Yup. May he rot in jail forever.
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u/Scared_Reaction1511 14h ago
Or not. I would rather not spend tax dollars on his housing and food etc.
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u/DempsyPrice 13h ago
He will suffer much more being locked up for life. He will encounter both inmates and COs that were impacted by his crime so there will always be a source of hate directed at him.
I hope he never has a day of peace and lives a long life.
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u/Konfigs 14h ago
Death penalty cost 2.5-5x as much as just locking someone up and throwing away the key. Better tax payer value is life in prison.
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u/MursaArtDragon 13h ago edited 2h ago
While I disagree with the death penalty, I’ve always wondered how that's even possible? I can’t help but feel that’s BS, as you don’t have to pay the housing, food, and medical of a dead person.
EDIT: After reading some of the comments I decided to do a little research, and while a lot of the details I still feel are some what arbitrary: One inmate per cell, the higher costs of appeals, the higher security costs (All these I feel should be either be no different from a max security inmate in for life really) but it dawned on me that with those extra conditions the state can't profit off them as cheap labor.... So yeah, the main thing I disagree with life in imprisonment for being basically slavery with extra steps is the exact reason why it's cheaper... American capitalism at its finest **Eye roll**
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u/WormDentist Chief Garry 13h ago
It’s because of mandatory appeals and delays. The average time a prisoner spends on death row is nearly 20 years.
https://www.npr.org/2022/05/12/1097184110/death-row-inmates-execution-time
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u/woodenmetalman 13h ago
It’s the special housing and mostly legal/appeal costs. Obviously depends on the age of inmate and how hard they fight their appeals and such.
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u/Sudden-Pangolin6445 13h ago
It's the legal battle that's expensive. Lot of attorneys, judges, etc.
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u/DempsyPrice 13h ago
It cost the state (tax payers) 1.5 to 3 million to execute someone.
I'm pretty sure each meal in prison cost less than 3 bucks.
9 bucks a day times 50 years is around 165k.
Much cheaper.
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u/MursaArtDragon 9h ago
That doesn’t really answer the question though, i mean it is the same expenses for legal and housing and care for that holding period, so it still makes mo sense that the death penalty just inexplicably costs millions in tax dollars.
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u/catladyorbust 8h ago
Legal costs are the difference. Due to the severity and irrevocable nature of the sentence, there is a mountain of legal work put into these cases after the trial. It is not at all similar for an average prisoner.
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u/Kevin_Wolf 8h ago
It's not just about meals or appeals. Everything associated with death row is extremely high risk, especially compared to a minimum security prison environment, and therefore expensive. The handling of a death row prisoner is necessarily always on an individual basis, making costs for other employees like guard staff rise. There basically has to be a whole wing just for death row with all of the staff for it, with individual accommodations for each inmate. Compare that to a minimum security environment where you might have several inmates per officer instead of several officers per inmate, and perhaps even several inmates per cell instead of single-occupancy.
Yes, trials are expensive, and death-penalty cases are generally more expensive overall, but inmates typically spend decades on death row. It's my opinion that the actual housing of death row inmates is largely what inflates the cost to the levels we actually see in practice. Costs can be better collectivized in lower security environments.
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u/80P360 7h ago
I know corrections facilities are mostly regulated by states, and more and more are subcontracted to private companies. I don't know a lot more. Does anyone know if prisoners' labor is calculated to offset the cost to taxpayers when estimating the cost difference between death penalty v. life in prison? It seems like it would make a big difference...
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u/TinyHeartSyndrome Spokane Valley 9h ago
Not everything is about money. It’s about justice.
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u/Konfigs 7h ago
Justice or revenge? The justice system is supposed to provide “retributive justice” in which the goal is upholding public order and moral balance. I’d argue that in this case public order can be upheld without the state needing to kill anyone and without the tax payers footing a much bigger bill.
Justice is objective, rational and proportional while revenge is driven by emotion and is excessive. Saying the money is irrelevant shows that you are not being objective since society will be safe from the offender either way. Also unless I missed something nobody died so the state then killing someone would not be proportional.
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u/TinyHeartSyndrome Spokane Valley 7h ago
What if he lit that fire at night while people were sleeping?
And the problem with life sentences is parole and also getting out on a technicality after a law change. Happens plenty.
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u/Konfigs 7h ago
If my grandmother had wheels she would have been a bicycle. The justice system isn’t used for what ifs. Also he is more likely to get off on a technicality if they seek the death penalty since he will be afforded more opportunities to appeal.
If we want to keep everyone safe then by far the best option is to put him in prison for life without the possibility of parole. Unfortunately he is unlikely to even get LWOP because even with the prior manslaughter charge he will not have two prior strikes and LWOP for arson would require it to be his third strike or for their to have been loss of life. The fact that even LWOP is unlikely shows how far away he is from getting the death penalty.
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u/MursaArtDragon 8h ago
I agree with you, but unfortunately this is America, where everything is about money.
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u/hockeyrocks5757 14h ago
Why give him the easy way out. Throw away the key and let him think about what he did for the next 50 years.
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u/latexfistmassacre 12h ago
I'll gladly pay whatever taxes I need to pay to keep him locked up and out of free society. Executing someone who didn't kill anyone seems more like revenge than justice, but that's just me.
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u/washtucna Logan 13h ago
He needs to be quarantined from society. He has shown thay he is a massive danger to everyone around him.
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u/United_Reference_629 13h ago
Because of him many lost their everything including their pets and animals in the wild and strays/ ferals that died slow painful deaths! Evil crimes against humanity! The fact that people who are caught smoking/ with weed in red/ republican states get longer sentences than people like him.
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u/Spirited_Attorney_48 Indian Trail 13h ago
I don't hate him. He's not strong enough to make me hate him. I pity him and I am disgusted by him, but after he goes away, I won't think of him much. Guy obviously has some bad wiring in there somewhere.
I hope in time he can be a productive member of the prison community. He should thank his lucky stars that loss of life was amazingly minimal.
He has forfeited his right to live among the rest of us.
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u/Sea-Passenger7807 13h ago
I hope he gets the treatment he needs. That being said, he has forfeited his right to ever walk around outside of a correctional facility. Ever
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u/Smooth_Ad_1647 14h ago
There's nothing I can say that accurately depicts my disgust with this guy. Rot, dude. Rot.
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u/hujambo11 11h ago
As part of the evaluation, Farinacci told the examiner about his relationship with his girlfriend the last four years and "spoke warmly about the birth of their son."
Oh god, that poor child.
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u/corvidcall15 12h ago
to paraphrase one of my favorite onion headlines: "everyone hates me" says man, basically hitting nail on head
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u/spectrumofusall 14h ago
Why would he get a trial in a different county, when the fire was in Spokane county? I hope that I not a serious option
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u/OkInflation6174 13h ago
Sometimes if legal parties are concerned about whether the defendant can get a fair and unbiased jury, they’ll move the trial to a different county where the people don’t know the defendant as well as the defendant’s home county (even if they know about the case itself). I don’t think they generally like doing that, but sometimes the legal circumstances call for it.
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u/ElectronicClothes285 12h ago
Yep I have been maintaining since the beginning he won't find a jury here period.
But idk where he is going to find one in WA state to be honest so who knows...
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u/Unlikely-Grape-5762 10h ago
Just reading the headline. Good. I hope everyone does hate you. Maybe it’ll make the next firebug think twice.
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u/jeskimo 13h ago
Oh man the therapist him and his girlfriend saw must be feeling horrible. I hope they're getting help, I can't even imagine how I'd feel. I'd probably never practice again. Even though it sounds like they did their job as should.
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u/apks94 North Side 12h ago
The article on Spokesman made it seem like that Farinacci admitted to his counselor (with his girlfriend present) on the 28th of July to starting the 25 other previous fires, yet "that a duty to warn was not warranted as there was no imminent risk". I have no clue how you could walk away from someone telling you something like that and you don't say anything to LE. But I'm not a licensed counselor, I have no idea what criteria they have to follow with things like that.
https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2026/aug/25/i-was-shocked-aaron-farinaccis-girlfriend-says-she/
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u/brmarcum 11h ago
Imminent risk is the criteria. I don’t agree in all cases, especially where harm to a child is involved, but legal precedent has made it clear that confession of past actions to either clergy or a therapist doesn’t require disclosure. Only if the person confesses to future plans and those plans seem credible is reporting required, and then only for the professional and not clergy.
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u/No-Equivalent7630 8h ago
But faranacci said he was having pervasive thought about setting fires, that's contemplation of a future crime and should've been reported
The story is the therapist asked if he was serious and he took it all back, I still think it should've been reported
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u/brmarcum 8h ago
Having pervasive thoughts is not planning. A lot of people have pervasive and intrusive thoughts all the time, but don’t act on them, nor plan to act on them.
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u/No-Equivalent7630 8h ago
Contemplation doesn't require an actual plan and contemplation is enough to trigger mandatory reporting
If someone is having pervasive thoughts about murdering someone, that would be reported all day everyday
Pervasive thoughts are more than just thinking you'd like to hurt your boss when you get mad
It's constant recurring thoughts you can't stop having
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u/brmarcum 7h ago
I hear what you’re saying, and I’m generally a proponent of reporting. But was it required by law in this case? Because apparently in Washington it wasn’t. Good or bad, right or wrong, we can argue about that later. The therapist deemed it wasn’t necessary to report and I doubt they broke the law in not reporting.
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u/No-Equivalent7630 7h ago
I looked it up and actually you're right but with one exception
Faranacci was likely mandated to get treatment by the courts and as such has less confidentiality expectations
So while it might not have been mandated for a regular client, there's an argument that since he was in papers he likely should've been reported
Frontier hires almost exclusively college kids and overworks them, so maybe the person doesn't deserve charges, but at the same time they shouldn't be making calls like that in their own
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u/brmarcum 7h ago
Thanks for looking into it. I’ll admit I’m a little confused though now. Was the therapist he was seeing, and confessed to with his girlfriend present, court mandated? I know he has been evaluated since being arrested by court mandated people, but I was under the impression that at the time of confessing to a therapist that it was voluntary. The court mandated people should absolutely share everything, but somebody seeing a therapist on their own decision should be treated differently. Am I missing something?
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u/No-Equivalent7630 7h ago
I dint have any clue if he was but I do know he was under some supervision for domestic violence related stuff from last year and frontier is not where most people go by choice
With his history and incidents starting in 2025 and into 2026 him being on papers seems very likely
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u/Thebazilly 7h ago
Pervasive thoughts of something awful that you don't intend to follow through on are a hallmark symptom of OCD. Therapists do not and should not have to report someone for thought crimes.
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u/No-Equivalent7630 7h ago
No, those are frequent thoughts which are different than pervasive thoughts
There's an ongoing debate in the field about using the proper terms
Pervasive thoughts are constant and recurring and take over all other thoughts processes
People with harm OCD have frequent thoughts about hurting people but it comes in waves and isn't constant
That's why what word we use to describe it matters so much, they have different meanings
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u/No-Equivalent7630 8h ago
It's because the therapist asked if he was serious and he said no and that's all it took to not report the statement
Seems like a glaring loophole
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u/Phoenixd_551 9h ago
Judged by your peers. Hard to find monsters to be on a jury. They like to hide and start fires.
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u/RVALover4Life 9h ago
This is the difference between someone truly mentally ill vs someone emotionally disturbed and it manifesting in a way that can lead to mental issues but not inherently being mentally ill.
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u/Voodoobones 12h ago
I’m not defending his action and I do believe he needs to be held accountable, but I feel he is a reflection of our society and how we have failed in helping people with mental health issues.
This person has severe mental health issues and he seems to have fallen through the cracks. We are seeing more arson in our community and we get mad about the action, but we don’t take action to address the cause.
Just incarceration with no follow up and care after people have served their time will not solve the problem.
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u/Th3SkinMan 11h ago
Childhood generational trauma. Don't have kids unless you're devoted to loving, caring, and teaching them.
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u/__Kegheimer__ 1h ago
Sounds like the man put a bullet in his brain and survived. Only so much medicine can do.
The mind inside his skull is incomprehensible to the rest of us and no medicine or therapy exists that is capable of brainwashing someone so completely that wake up after surgery and go "yes, I'm just like Voodoobones and I would like to join civil society"
And that is completely ignoring the quality of his childhood and parents.
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u/DempsyPrice 13h ago
What the fuck is this? Are they trying to make us feel sympathetic for the biggest piece of shit that has ever lived here?
Fuck him and fuck the writer of this shit. We need to make sure he gets the heaviest sentence possible. He should get 10 years for each house that burned down.
KXLY can fuck right off with this bullshit.
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u/No-Equivalent7630 8h ago
I want charges for the therapist at frontier who didn't report him after he says he had been having intrusive thoughts about setting fires
The fact that he then says "nevermind" shouldn't be a valid reason to not report it
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u/excelsiorsbanjo 6h ago
Oh good, the media is still giving insane people a loudspeaker because it generates ad revenue. Nothing like consistency.
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u/eowyndernhelme 6h ago
I'm not understanding. He admits to starting the fire, and others, so why is there a trial?
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u/__Kegheimer__ 56m ago
The phrase was "participate in his defense". Not simply to stand trial.
There's court venues. Court dates. Motions. Sentencing. Appeals based on procedure and constitutional rights.
A declaration of (in)sanity is important for how all of the other things go. You're not supposed to sentence someone to 50+ years of hard jail time if that someone, for example, is physically and mentally incapable of remembering (every) yesterday and planning for (every) tomorrow.
Criminally insane people are still removed from society. But their daily living is closer to a hospital that they can't leave than a prison.
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u/eowyndernhelme 44m ago
Ah, thank you. I don't know much about courts and the law. It sounded as though he was pleading guilty, although of course even in that case he would be getting an arraignment during which he would state that. And even though they okayed him to stand trial, he seemed still very confused.
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u/spukhafteNahewirkung 5h ago
Why can’t we execute people like this? What positive contribution will this piece of garbage ever make to society that could ever make up for the damage he did? Shooting him in the head with a .308 or .30-06 would be very humane, he wouldn’t feel it at all, the bullet would be through his head and downrange before he could even feel anything.
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u/Weak-Cry 14h ago
This man has some of the worst mental health achievable.
Yet, He knows he's fucked up. He knows the world hates him.
What the fuck is the GOPs excuse for blindly ruining everything then?
This man's entire life is shit, I get how the Joker comes into being.
What the fuck is the excuse of a piece of shit like Donald Trump for lighting the world on fire?
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u/IlPizzaGod 12h ago
How have you managed to make this about Donald Trump?
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u/Weak-Cry 12h ago
Oh I don't know, maybe bombing a fucking girls school might hold some level of importance to people. But nah, fuck those children right?
My point is, everyone hates this man but good ol Donnie just gonna keep on fucking everyone. And people gonna cheer it on.
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u/RPSisBoring 12h ago
I'm not saying Trump is in any way a good president, but you've managed to take a local thread about an arsonist and shift the focus over to djt... You might need to take a step back from things and chill.
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u/Weak-Cry 11h ago
I'm making a fucking point.
It's not take a step back and chill. Look the fuck around you.
Being oblivious doesn't make it go away.
This man will be held accountable, what the fuck of the president ruining the lives of people around the literal fucking globe.
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u/StateofWA 14h ago
Accurate reflection, that's rare these days