‘Huge blessing’: East Texas deputy receives community support after home fire

JEFFERSON, Texas (KETK) – An East Texas deputy and his family lost everything to a home fire and now they are trying to move forward and rebuild.

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“We burned some leaves and we wetted everything down,” Chuck Rodgers, a criminal investigator with the Marion County Sheriff’s Office, said. “We went inside and we heard a pop and came out and our shed was on fire. Before we could do anything else, it spread over to the house.”

Rodgers said he witnessed as his family’s home burned to the ground. Within the home irreplaceable items and memories were lost to the flames.

“Photographs and bibles,” Rodgers said. “We had a family bible from my great grandmother that was well over 120 years old.”

After more than 30 years in law enforcement, Rodgers said he has responded to dozens of fires but he never thought he would find himself on this side of it.

“Being on this side, it’s just very difficult and hard to explain,” Rodgers said. “I would never wish this on anybody.”

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The silver lining to it all is that he is not going through this alone. Rodgers said, neighbors have rallied behind him and his loved ones in their time of need.

“We’ve had an outreach from the community and that’s been a huge blessing, that’s really one of the things keeping me going right now,” Rodgers said.

Brick by brick, Rodgers said they plan to start over again in the same spot.

The Marion County First Responder Prayer Force is currently accepting donations to raise funds to go directly to the Rodgers family as the rebuild from the ground up.

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