HOUMA, La. – Three more fires have been linked to the Little Caillou firefighter who was charged on Monday with aggravated arson.
Jesse Marcel, 21, was arrested after investigators tied him to a residential fire on La. Hwy. 56 in Chauvin this past weekend. Marcel, a firefighter with the Little Caillou Fire Department, confessed to setting a fire at a fellow firefighters house, Terrebonne Parish Sherif Vernon Bourgeois said.
Subsequently, TPSO and Louisiana State Fire Marshall’s found that Marcel was connected to three other fires, all in August 2009.
On Aug, 4, Bourgeois said, a fire was set to a picnic table beneath a patio of a house in the 100 block of Mall Circle in Houma. The home suffered no damage and no one was injured.
A day later, a wicker table and chairs were set on fire in the 200 block of Douglas Drive in Houma. The fire eventually burned the ceiling of a carport, but was noticed by a 14-year-old, who extinguished the fire with a hose.
And on Aug. 9, another fire was set in the 200 block of Douglas Drive. The house was under construction and a flatbed trailer housing materials and trash from the home was damaged in the blaze.
Investigators determined that Marcel was living where all of the fires were set and was there each time the fires were put out.
Bourgeois said Marcel admitted to setting the fires that happened on Aug. 4 and 9.
Marcel was charged with aggravated arson for the Aug. 4 fire because people were inside the house, Bourgeois said. He was charged with simple arson on Aug. 9 because no one was inside the home.
Bourgeois said the motive for each fire was to set the fires and then extinguish them.
However, Marcel has denied setting the Aug. 5 fire.
He remains in Terrebonne Parish Jail on a $1.1 million bond.
