Joan Fairfield often spoke of how her childhood, which was a difficult one, in many ways helped her understand the trauma that the thousands of crime victims she would later care for experienced. Joan began working as a victim advocate in the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office in 1979. “For my mother,” her daughter Kelly Selman said, “this position was an answer to her prayers and the prayers offered by a group of church friends for victims affected by terrible crimes.” That same group of friends gathered in Joan’s final hours to offer prayers for her.
Despite the troubles she experienced early on, Joan’s imagination saved her spirit in many ways. Growing up in Michigan, Joan was convinced she could ice-skate like Sonja Henie if she only had the costume. After marriage to Joe Selman in 1961, Joan soon became the very proud mother of three children: Scott, Kelly, and Todd. Devoted to her children, Joan was involved in all their sports activities and school projects. In fact, she was frequently called “the best Girl Scout leader — ever.”
Joe’s job brought the family to Santa Barbara, but in 1986, Joan returned to Michigan to care for her mother, who had leukemia, the same disease that ultimately claimed Joan. She and Joe divorced. During a dinner with friends, Joan met up again with her high school sweetheart, Pete Fairfield. “Every missing piece of her life’s puzzle fell in front of her,” Kelly Selman recalled. Joan and Pete married a few years later.