The Toledo Fire and Rescue Arson Investigative Unit continue to examine multiple fires that have occurred throughout the city and are asking for residents’ help. 

The department was offering a reward of up to $5,000 for information leading to an arrest of individuals involved, but late Thursday police had a breakthrough and arrested an arson suspect, 18-year-old Joshua Havermale of 502 Potter Street, East Toledo.

On Thursday, Police Chief Michael Navarre and Toledo Fire and Rescue Chief Luis Santiago held a press conference at 5:45 p.m. to discuss details of the arrest at the Safety Building.

The most recent East Toledo fire occurred Wednesday night at 415 Greenwood Ave. The house was demolished one day later. (Press photo by Ken Grosjean)

The suspect was nearby as firefighters battled a blaze last Wednesday.

“There was a fire last night at a vacant house at 415 Greenwood and while the firefighters and police officers were at the scene, there was a person who came forward and pointed out a possible suspect to us. It actually was quite obvious to the battalion chief who was on the scene,” said Chief Navarre said.

“Police officers kept this person under surveillance and the witness was then approached by the suspect. When that happened, it looked like there was going to be a confrontation, so the police officers intervened and ended up arresting the suspect for misconduct at an emergency,” Chief Navarre continued.

“They took him downtown and interrogated him. It was a joint interrogation by the arson investigation unit and Sergeant Ashley Michaels from the police department. As a result, the suspect did end up confessing to the fire last night on Greenwood and he also confessed to setting a second fire a few days earlier on Potter Street.”

“That’s pretty much all we are releasing at this time, pending an additional investigation. We’ve developed a name of a possible additional suspect who we want to track down and talk to also. There is the possibility that there may be some other charges forthcoming.”

Keeping firefighters busy
Of 18 fires throughout the city since July 2, eight have been in East Toledo. Locations include along Woodville Road and Chasborough, Berry, Forsythe, Potter and Oak streets. All are vacant houses.

The most recent East Toledo fire occurred Wednesday night at 451 Greenwood Avenue. Lt. David Stout said city crews demolished the house the next day, an expense to taxpayers.

Lt. David Stout said the fires have been keeping firefighters busier than usual.

“They are just hitting them hard,” said Lt. Stout. “If we could compare this to December or January, this is a higher number. At the beginning of winter, you’ll usually have the start-up fires where people are just starting up their furnaces and they haven’t serviced stuff. Or late in the winter when people are low on money and they are using whatever they can to fill their kerosene heaters.

“You can attribute those to a factor. This is just random acts of violence here. Somebody is going to get hurt. We are going to get a neighboring house on fire, and who knows what can happen with that.

The firefighters are running into traps that seem to be meant to cause injury, although Lt. Stout does not believe that is always the case.

“I’ve run into that in the past. I can’t speak for these fires,” Lt. Stout said. “I don’t know why people would do that — it’s hard to say.

“Sometimes, it may look that way, and it’s just that the house was just vandalized. All the copper was taken out, and the duct work and ends up with holes in the floors. So sometimes that may get misconstrued. But there are incidents where you will go in there and there will be holes chopped right in front of the stairwell, or you’ll have bags right in front on the gas lines with the valves open. That does happen, but I can’t speak for any of these fires.”

Lt. Stout believes it is serial arsonists causing the fires, but that may not be true in every case.

“It could go either way. You could get a copycat who wants insurance,” Lt. Stout said. “They are all under investigation. I think you get a lot of that,  ‘Let’s get on the bandwagon here. I can get rid of a property I don’t want and they are not going to look at me.’ But that’s for the investigators to look at.”

No matter who is causing the fires, investigators cannot be sure of the motive yet. It may be just be someone’s idea of a good time, it could be economically motivated, and there are other possibilities, the lieutenant said.

“Its idle time and you know what that breeds,” Lt. Stout said. “We talk about that in task force meetings and stuff. They look at everything. They look at neighbors, they look at any crime stopper tips they get, and they take all that seriously. They look at owners, business partners — everybody gets looked at."

“Of course, you get some egos bruised and you get some people upset, but they are just doing their job. You get good information and you get bad information and you’ve got to follow up on everything. They take offense to it and feel they are being harassed and we are just trying to mark them off the list.”

Lt. Stout says the arsonists may not necessarily be limiting their targets to vacant homes in low income areas, either.

“I always hate to throw that out there because I think every neighborhood is equal. But, yeah, I mean that does happen. That does seem to tear into low income areas where there are a lot of vacant houses and where there have been a lot of layoffs in that area and people have moved on,” he said.

No one has been seriously hurt yet, but the fires have caused collateral damage. In addition, if the fires continue Lt. Stout fears it will only be a matter of time before someone gets badly hurt.

“Knock on wood, nobody has been hurt. We’ve had people go down from heat exhaustion and stuff like that, but nothing serious,” he said. “We’ve had some damage (to neighboring houses). We’ve had some exposure issues where people have had smoke damage or get some water damage or their siding will get melted. There is a lot of collateral damage that happens.”

He said investigators have ruled out the possibility that oppressive 90 degree heat is to blame for causing spontaneous combustion.

“I think that would be an oddity. When you get the cold months coming around and you get people just trying to find a place to harbor up, trying to stay warm, that will get out of hand on them,” Lt. Stout said. “I don’t think the heat will be a contributing factor to anything spontaneous, unless you’ve got a hay barn or something like that.

“We’ve had a little break here the last few days, which has been good. Believe it or not, it seems like the fires have slowed down. But the heat and humidity are supposed to back (last Thursday) and we really stress with our people to keep everybody hydrated, locating crews, and use common sense stuff.”

Anyone with further information is asked to call the Toledo Police Investigative Unit at 419-245-3142, the Toledo Fire and Rescue Arson Investigation Unit at 419-245-1131, or the Crime Stopper program at 419-255-1111.  Callers may remain anonymous.

“Keep your eyes open,” Lt. Stout said. “Every tip is taken seriously. Just tell everybody to just be aware of their surroundings.

“The Toledo Firefighters Prevention Bureau is more than willing to come out to Block Watch meetings and help people with what to look for and stuff like that. We want to really get involved in the community and pitch our free smoke detector stuff. We’ve got free smoke detectors at every firehouse.”

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