Boy May Have Burned House With Lighter

A fire possibly ignited by 4-year-old child playing with cigarette lighters in his bedroom early Thursday caused damage estimated at $100,000, authorities said.

When investigators arrived, they found at least half a dozen fluid lighters on the floor and scattered about the house, Fire Capt. Stephen Shirley said.

When they asked the 4-year-old if he had been playing with one of the lighters, the boy began to cry, he said.

The boy’s mother, Destiny Hoang, had been cooking in the kitchen of the three-bedroom home in the 13800 block of La Vaughn Street about 8:40 a.m. when the smoke detector sounded, Shirley said.

She found the boy’s bedroom engulfed in flames and got everyone, including at least two children, out of the house, firefighters said.

Hoang told investigators that the boy might have been playing with a lighter, fire officials said.

Hoang also used a fire extinguisher, but “it didn’t have any impact” on the blaze, Shirley said.

“The rear bedroom, where the child was playing, was totally gutted. The fire came out of that bedroom across the hallway through the bathroom and some other rooms. . . . The heat was so intense that anything plastic just melted and dripped down.”

The blaze took 14 firefighters about 20 minutes to control and destroyed most of the home’s contents, authorities said.