Posted on 12/08/2016 12:54:00 PM PST by grundle
New York firefighter Jason Stokes, 41, has pleaded not guilty to the felony arson charge.
A firefighter in upstate New York is facing a felony arson charge after authorities say he set his family’s house on fire and wrote an anti-police message outside as a potential cover-up.
Jason Stokes, 41, pleaded not guilty Tuesday to felony second-degree arson following the mysterious Aug. 10 summer blaze in Endicott, just west of Binghamton, local station TV WBNG reported.
Stokes, his wife and two teenaged children escaped the home safely, state police said.
Broome County District Attorney Steve Cornwell described an “obstacle course” inside the house that firefighters had to get through.
“There were gas cans, full gas cans and other containers full with flammable material, placed throughout the home as if it were an obstacle course to get around,” he said at a press conference Tuesday.
Authorities say they found a “Blue Lives Matter” flag outside the home and a spray-painted message on a wall reading: “Lie with pigs, fry like bacon.”
Cornwell called the message, which he refused to repeat, a “despicable display of how law enforcement should be viewed in society today.” He suggested that the message was meant to throw off investigators into believing anti-police protesters were to blame. He declined to speculate on a possible motive.
At the time of the incident, the family suggested that the fire was a targeted attack against them, WBNG reported.
Stokes was released Wednesday on $10,000 bail. An attempt to reach him for comment Thursday was not immediately successful.
A trial date is set for April 17.
(Excerpt) Read more at huffingtonpost.com ...
Don’t get me started.
Lots of desperate attention whores out there these days.
Holy bleep! That’s my hometown.
Guess he won’t get to collect the insurance after all, while leaving his family homeless. Now that was really stupid.
Dumbsh*t. Anytime you see these graffiti “crimes”, you can rest assured that 98% are phonier than Obama’s birth certificate.
False Flag.
Depends on the state. Some have innocent spousal laws, so he’ll get to serve some time — but the insurance may have to pay.
“Stokes was released Wednesday on $10,000 bail. An attempt to reach him for comment Thursday was not immediately successful.”
He is getting special treatment.
He sets his house on fire while his wife and children are inside the house and he gets released on $10,000 bail?
He is an arsonist and he tried to kill his family.
I’m suspecting he did that so the fire would appear less suspicious. They’ve been known to catch people committing arson on their own homes due to pets and valuables not being in the house. If that’s the case, I’d go further and suspect that at least his wife knew, too.
So your theory is that with his wife’s knowledge, and with his kids in the house, he set the house on fire?
Then both mom and dad need to go to prison.
This is my old home-town, Endicott. I have met this bastard, and I pretty much wanted to smack his teeth into the back of his throat as soon as he opened his mouth.
That was about eleven years ago, but I never forgot his lunging at me and his crazy eyes.
I know a LOT about this case, and I have ever since he set fire to his own home. I can not talk about any of it of course, because I do not want anyone to get into trouble - but I have many police and fire contacts in that county, so I have been waiting for this guy to be arrested.
Hey! I was born there! On Squires Ave, on the North side.
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