11 Cars Set Ablaze in San Gabriel Valley

A suspected arsonist has set 11 cars on fire in the San Gabriel Valley during a three-week period, injuring four people, causing more than $1 million in damage to apartment buildings and vehicles and leaving at least one family homeless, authorities said Thursday.

The early morning fires in Alhambra, Monterey Park and San Gabriel started in vehicles parked in carports beneath apartment buildings, and many spread to apartments.

But even as law enforcement officials from three cities held a news conference in Alhambra on Thursday to announce their combined efforts to investigate the fires, another car was set ablaze inneighboring San Gabriel.

Authorities believe the same person or persons are responsible for the fires. And with the blazes intensifying in frequency, officials fear the worst may be yet to come.

“The stats will tell you it’s only a matter of time until we have a serious injury or death,” said Battalion Chief Greg O’Sullivan of the San Gabriel Fire Department. “There is no reason for mass panic at this point,” O’Sullivan said. “But it is very important that word gets out to people to be very aware of the people around them, especially if they live in an apartment with a . . . carport.”

Although eight of the 11 victims are of Asian descent, investigators do not know whether the arson fires are hate crimes, because Asian Americans make up a significant percentage of the area’s population.

The blazes are started under the tires of the cars and quickly engulf the vehicles. Though the incidents have been scattered across the three small cities, they have so far stayed within a four- or five-square-mile area, authorities said.

“I’ve been doing this for 10 years,” said Alhambra Division Chief John Kabala, head of that city’s arson investigation squad. “I have never seen serial arsonists like this.”

The first fire occurred Feb. 24 in the 900 block of South Edith Avenue in Alhambra, and the second was 12 days later. The blazes had become more frequent by the next week. The first injury occurred March 16, when an Alhambra firefighter suffered second-degree burns. Fires then began occurring in neighboring San Gabriel and Monterey Park.

About 4:30 a.m. Wednesday, a blaze began beneath a three-unit apartment building in the 200 block of North Alhambra Avenue in Monterey Park. The flames enveloped a car and shot through the ceiling of the carport, sending the residents--a man and his teenage daughter--leaping to safety from the second floor.

The two, left homeless by the blaze, were treated for multiple injuries. A Monterey Park firefighter suffered second-degree burns, Monterey Park Battalion Chief Marc Revere said. The entire building was badly damaged and may be a total loss, authorities said. That was the third arson fire in the area Wednesday morning.

Thursday afternoon, members of the three fire departments gathered in Alhambra to announce the formation of a task force to search for the arsonist or arsonists. Meanwhile, a fire was started under a Mercedes-Benz parked in a carport at an apartment building in the 900 block of Charlotte Avenue in San Gabriel.

Michelle Delay, who lives in the building, said she heard three bangs at about 3:30 p.m.--probably tires exploding, investigators said.

“I knew somebody made it happen,” Delay said. “A Mercedes doesn’t just catch on fire like that.”

Authorities say they do not know if the arsonist was aware that a news conference about the fires was underway when the blaze--the first that had occurred in the afternoon--was set.

“It could be an irony,” O’Sullivan said, or “that somebody knew.”

The possibility of more random blazes left some residents nervous Thursday night. On North Alhambra Avenue in Monterey Park, Jenny Love said she would move out of the home where she was raised.

“This was the last straw,” said Love, 38, who lives with her daughter and mother in the damaged building. “We don’t feel comfortable here, because we don’t know if its going to happen again. . . . People could have gotten killed.”

Firefighters were also nervous.

“It’s going to be an uneasy night,” O’Sullivan said. “Every time the bell goes off, I’m sure [firefighters] are going to be thinking the same thing.”