Hard-luck singer Freddy Fender returned home from Christmas Eve church services to find firefighters mopping up from a fire that filled his house in Corpus Christi, Texas, with smoke.
The fire burned a closet. Firefighters were able to save the rest of the house because a policeman on patrol spotted the smoke.The blaze was believed to have been caused by an electrical problem in a ceiling light.
Fender has often had hard times, including a prison term for possession of marijuana, the deaths of two band members in a bus accident, and a 1983 bankruptcy.