Oklahoma City Family Homeless After Christmas Day Fire

Jon Jordan, News 9

OKLAHOMA CITY -- A family loses everything this Christmas after a fire rips through their home in Southwest Oklahoma City. It happened earlier just before noon - and just an hour before the family returned home to pick up their Christmas presents.

Making this fire even tougher on the family is they already have very little money and not enough to afford homeowners insurance. The fire leaves the family with nothing but the clothes on their backs.

"It's horrifying," said Shannon Baker, whose home in the 3200 block of South Portland was destroyed by fire Christmas Day.

"I have nothing. It's all gone."

That includes the Christmas presents Shannon Baker and her husband had saved up to buy for their two kids.

"Worst Christmas I ever had," Baker said. "Hopefully I can try to look at the positive, but I look at my house, and I don't know if there is any positive in it."

Baker and her husband Johnny had left for no more than a few hours. When they returned they found their home surrounded by police tape and much of their belongings now on their front lawn.

"Everything we owned was in that house, everything," she said. "Didn't think this would happen. I mean we got a lot of problems in our lives, but I didn't think this was going to be one of them.

Pierce says fire fighters told them the fire appears suspicious because we they arrived the back door looked as if it had been kicked open – news the couple is choosing not to tell their children.

"I don't know how to tell them someone messed up their Christmas because someone set the house on fire," Shannon Baker said.

The family's only help now - the Red Cross. They are helping to provide clothes and shelter. It's help the family knows will only last for so long.

"We're still kinda shocked about it, to be honest with you," said Johnny Pierce, Baker's husband. "Really don't know what to do from here on out. Hopefully find a place to live."

If the family is unable to find a place to stay, they say their only other option will be to live out of their van.