A 29-year-old man has been arrested and charged after a fire destroyed two homes and damaged six others in Frisco. NBC 5’s Meredith Yeomans has the latest on the investigations and new surveillance videos from the scene.
A man from Austin is accused of starting a trash fire outside a home in Frisco, and is considered a person of interest in a devastating fire a few miles away.
Jonathan Webb, 29, from Austin is charged with deadly conduct in connection with a fire in the 4600 block of Haverford Drive in Frisco at about 10 p.m.
Neighbors say the fire was started in a debris pile in the alley from a home renovation. The homeowner says he used fire extinguishers and a water hose to keep the flames at bay until firefighters arrived.
The small fire was quickly contained.
Webb was arrested fleeing the scene, officials said, on a public intoxication charge and on outstanding warrants out of Dallas. The deadly conduct charge was later added.
Kelly Kistner, Fire Marshal and Public Information Officer for the Frisco Fire Department, said Webb matched the description of a person of interest seen leaving a separate fire around 4 p.m. in the 6300 block of Memorial Drive in Frisco.
A total of eight homes were affected.
"Whether it was the one that burned completely, the ground, the one next to it that had the roof, that was damaged," Kelly Kistner, Fire Marshal and Public Information Officer for the Frisco Fire Department said. "There were fences that were damaged. Some of the folks across the street had damaged their windows from the heat."
The fire on Memorial Drive began at a home that was under construction. Video recorded by a witness showed the frame of the home engulfed.
Kistner says neighbors near Memorial Drive were instrumental in provided police with pictures of a person of interest. Those pictures were not shared with NBC 5.
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“(The description) came in as having worn khaki style pants, a red shirt, a blue sweatshirt over the top of it. And we did have a picture of him at that time," Kistner said.
Investigators are working to determine Webb’s motive to allegedly start a fire on two properties.
"They're not even a permanent resident of North Texas. They were here visiting,” Kistner said.
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On Tuesday afternoon, investigators with Frisco and Lewisville Fire and ATF combed through rubble.
"We do have Lewisville Fire Department here with us. That's because one of their investigators is actually the handler for that ATF dog," Kistner said. "What the investigators are going to do here is we're going to completely divide this entire area into small quadrants. We'll allow the dog to work. We'll also take samples from every one of those quadrants… We'll see if there's anything that's there, whether it be a chemical, whether it be gasoline, or whether it be nothing at all... We're not here to prove arson. We're here to come up with what actually caused the fire, whether it's a criminal offense or not."
Late Tuesday, jail records in Denton County showed Webb was charged with arson though it's unclear to which fire the charge connected.
