My town is burning down around me.

[shoju]

40 Suspicious Fires now since June 13th.

And, according to this article, we have

...the only person remaining in the department's fire prevention bureau, is working on the case daily, and the state fire marshal’s office is assisting.

The city police department has loaned a detective to help with the investigation, and crime analyst Bev Lewis is mapping the sites to see if any trends emerge.

TWO LOCAL PEOPLE, WITH SOME HELP FROM THE STATE FIRE MARSHALL.

I'm just... To give this some perspective, Mansfield is not a big place. 29.9 SQ Miles, and 47,821 people according to the 2010 census. We are not a big place at all.

The Conspiracy Theories started in late august, when after 2 and a half months we were at around 20 fires. They range from

• The city is doing it to clean up the abandoned properties.
  
• The city is doing it to prove that we need more firefighters (we have lost a lot since '08)
  
• It's a secret rebuilding process for Fannie May and Freddie Mac. Burn down the abandoned stuff, so that they can swoop in and buy it all and use it to rebuild the company (I would be doing a disservice to the crazies if I didn't mention theirs)
  
• It's the (insert the opposite political party of what you support) trying to use it as a way to scare the low income neighborhoods into voting for them by spreading fear
  

Personally, I think there is a group of people who like seeing things burn, and they know that the abandoned stuff wont get anyone killed. There was a short break between the first few, and then second round. Almost like a waiting period to see fi they were caught. When they weren't, now they are at it, and it's escalating.

Four Fires this week. And now, it seems like some of the fires are more intense. More... destructive.

It seems like only a matter of time before this town is burnt to the ground, and all we have working the case is 1 firefighter, 1 mansfield gumshoe detective, and some "help" from the state fire marshall's office.

I just can't help but wonder what in the HELL its going to take before a larger agency steps in and gets this handled.

[Kevin]

That is crazy.

As to the lack of manpower on it, I wonder what assistance has been requested. Smaller agencies do tend to not want larger ones involved, and the requests may not have been made. But still things do need to move faster, you would think after the first 10 to 20 a larger agency should have been involved somehow. I say that many due to the speed at which they happened, it takes time, unlike some of the movies, to get someone else involved sometimes and that is only a couple of weeks at the pace things went.

It's my understanding that a typical fire investigation can take 40 - 80 man hours. There has to be evidence cataloging and testing of that to get full details to definitively determine cause, and to produce information that some insurance companies want, etc. Only having one person that is trained/responsible for it in a town that size seems low, two or 3 would seem to make sense. The whole "only remaining member" seems to me that it's likely training hasn't happened for others, either because of budget cuts, or because everyone else has been busy fighting/dealing with the aftermath of all the fires and hasn't been able to get away for training since it does take time to train for it. A quick google shows certification courses taking 3 weeks or so, which makes sense.

I do agree that with the changes there is likely a copy cat involved now. That is somewhat typical with most repeated criminal acts, someone else starts to think, "Hey I can do that too!".

I do hope it gets solved soon though. It's fortunate that it's been abandoned stuff and it sounds like the fire dept is keeping them all contained, but fire is tricky unruly stuff and the worry that it spreads and injures/kills someone is understandable.

[shoju]

I'm not sure what assistance has been requested. The City itself has been very "mum" on the whole thing, which is only fueling the conspiracy theories that this is somehow being done by the city.

Yeah, I figured at 10 it would be noticed, 20, and someone might be saying "WTF is going on in Mansfield?!" 30, I would have guessed that it was "SRSBIZNESS", and now that we've hit 40.... It's crazy.

We have lost over half of our Fire Department's employees since 2008. To me, I'm stunned that none of these fires have spiraled out of control, and burnt a block down. A New Map with all the fires.

If you look at the map I linked, Zoom in, so that St Rt 13 and 430 (Park Ave W) are "Crosshairs" in the center of the map. Everything in the South East of that, is a Low Income neighborhood. The houses are Wood, and close together. There are plenty of old Garages, and buildings, and small businesses. It's a pretty standard 50's / 60's neighborhood that has fallen into disrepair. On the South West of the 13/430 intersection, this neighborhood tapers off. Sturges St is really the "end" of that neighborhood. It's weird. Sturges is at the top of a hill (But really Mansfield is full of hills....) and as you reach the top of this hill and head west, the neighborhoods start improving.

As some Lurkers who know me can verify, Arthur Ave is getting pretty close to where I live. (I live near the hospital). For some of those fires, the smoke was visible from my front porch.

And now, with the idea that there could be a copycat, the chance of something going terribly wrong is higher. What if these start happening at the same time? 2 fires that don't get out of control, could probably be handled. 1 that gets out of control + 1 more, and we are starting to get pretty nervous. 2 that end up out of control, and it's a serious problem.

Another Conspiracy Theory (that Mansfield is doing it to clean up the abandoned properties), points at the "re-burns". #2 and #27 were at the same address. #27 rendered the structure ruined. #17 and #18 were the same.
#8, #24, and #27 were all on the same property, even though #8 wasn't the same "structure" as the other two.

I've sent messages, and left voicemails with larger TV stations. Our local station isn't viewed outside of the area, so I've been appealing to stations in Columbus and Cleveland (the ABC, NBC, and Foc Affiliates) to try and pick it up, and take the story. Our local SuperWoman Reporter has done a fantastic job covering it, and blasting it all over Social Media, but sometimes, I feel like she doesn't have the support of the city / paper behind her in it. She, and the few others who have covered the stories when she is busy are the only ones we hear about it from. Very few comments from the city, very little pressure put on the city to comment.

An Aside, you can skip this part
The reporter really is super woman. Reporter, Model, Cleveland Indians Hostess, Aspiring Actress, interviewer of Presidential Candidates (both Obama and Romney stopped here. She interviewed them both. She was the only local reporter with Obama from the time he landed until the time he took off), Radio Disney Personality. And she still busts her ass to be the best reporter she can be for the community.
Just wanted to give her props, even if she will never read this.

[eppie]

40 Suspicious Fires now since June 13th.

Seems like a pretty typical pyromaniac case. Happens everywhere now and then.
Firemen are often the culprit (just as pedophiles are attracted to becoming a priest, pyromaniacs are attracted to becoming firemen).
Also look for bystanders (so whenever there is a fire start filming everyone who is in the vicinity and later check all the footage and look if you see same faces (pyromaniacs ALWAYS watch their fire).

Most of the time they are (a part from their mania) pretty normal, and indeed that is why they usually choose abandoned places.....because they indeed don't want to make victims. But you are correct that when things escalate things might get more dangerous.

In Holland we just had a case like this solved.....also 10s of fires of a longer period in one town. They finally got the guy. He had himself called in two of the fires, was always watching, and registered for voluntarry firefighting work.

Of course it can always be something completely different but 9 out of 10 cases it turns out like this.

[LochnarITB]

Absolutely correct, I really hate this kind of hypocrisy...

Oh, me too! Could you expound on that a bit more? I would really like to hear your views to see how closely we agree. It is so hard to find a kindred spirit on these kind of things.

[kandrathe]

Absolutely correct, I really hate this kind of hypocrisy...

"Because some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn. " -- Alfred Pennyworth

If you are a pyromaniac and join the Fire department, you can get paid to watch it burn.

[shoju]

Times like this I wish I still had my limited Mod Powers. I would smite you so hard.

[Tal]

Times like this I wish I still had my limited Mod Powers. I would smite you so hard.

Smitededed. But I'll need Bolty to remove the Tool's posts.