Mystery Circles Maryland Arsons

After sifting through rubble for a day and a half, investigators on Tuesday had a clearer picture of the arson that consumed 12 houses and damaged 14 more at the 308-acre Hunters Brooke subdivision near here -- but were no closer to identifying a motive.

The number of houses damaged in the fire that broke out early Monday was reduced from the 41 initially reported, but investigators added three houses, for a total of seven, to the list of those that showed evidence of being deliberately set aflame.

Deputy state fire marshal W. Faron Taylor said Monday’s estimate of $10 million in damage would stand. An official for Lennar Homes, the Hunters Brooke builder, declined comment.

Although houses several blocks away were evacuated Monday morning, only one family could not return home Tuesday. The burned houses were not yet occupied, officials said.

Taylor said the investigation team was made up of more than 100 officials from eight agencies, including the FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. Chemists, engineers and fire investigators from the nearby counties of Prince George’s and Anne Arundel in Maryland and Fairfax in Virginia also are involved.

“This is one of the largest scenes our guys have done,” said Mike Campbell, a spokesman for the ATF. “Probably our next largest one was our participation out in Vail, Colo.”

In that 1998 incident, the militant environmental group Earth Liberation Front burned down three buildings, causing $12 million in damage -- all in the name of preserving nature.

Authorities here in Charles County were not ruling out the possibility that the latest fire also was an act of eco-terrorism, although the signatures typically left by the activists, which include graffiti claiming responsibility for blazes, have not been found.

Several environmental groups, including the Sierra Club, the Maryland Alliance for Greenway Improvement and Conservation and the Maryland Native Plant Society, had filed lawsuits to halt construction at the site, which abuts a rare magnolia bog. Known as Araby bog, it is one of 11 such wetlands that exist only in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, according to Karen Molines, spokeswoman for the plant society.

Although still very rural, Charles County illustrates a new national pattern of migration: young professionals moving farther from city centers to raise their families beyond suburban rings, in the bucolic settings of former horse and cattle farms. The county has nearly tripled its population since 1970, and continues to grow at a rate of 2% a year.

Plans call for Hunters Brooke and a companion subdivision, Falcon Ridge, to have 503 homes, most with four or five bedrooms and costing between $400,000 and $500,000.

Indian Head, a town of 4,000 that now is not much more than a strip of supply stores and family restaurants, stands on the cusp of tremendous growth. Town manager Ron Young said 76 townhouses, priced around $200,000 each, would be going in across from town hall. Another development scheduled for completion in about 18 months calls for 26 townhouses and 52 single-family homes, he said.

Longtime residents, dismayed by the large-scale blaze, on Tuesday said outsiders must be to blame. The theories ranged from eco-terrorists to disgruntled workers.

“This isn’t [a] Charles County thing,” said Nathaniel Brown, a bricklayer taking a break at the Mattawoman Restaurant down the road from Hunters Brooke.

Security and room for their two children, ages 3 and 12, were exactly what Dawn Hightower of nearby Waldorf said she and her husband, Jacque, had in mind a year and a half ago when they looked for a house in Hunters Brooke.

“We’d been searching for our dream home and we finally found it,” said Jacque Hightower, who works in Washington for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The Hightowers, who have been living with relatives for seven months, said they had planned to walk through the final inspection Tuesday and move in Thursday. Because the neighborhood is now a crime scene, they were not permitted to go near their house to check its condition.

“Plans now? Honestly, we’re just in limbo now,” Jacque Hightower said.