Firemen or Firebugs?, p.

1
Anna L. McCord
UWRT 1102
October 22, 2014

Firemen of Firebugs?
Stopping the Arsonist Before He Starts
Introduction/Background

Its three in the morning, you awaken to a sudden rise in temperature. You sit up straight
in be and take in a deep breath. The once refreshing air in your room slices through your lungs
like a dagger. You realize your room is filled with thick black smoke. You panic for a moment,
then remember what you learned so many years ago in elementary school. You stay low to the
ground and make your way to your bedroom door. The doorknob is cool to the touch so you
open it. Heat immediately floods over your face taking your breath away as the once cool air of
your room pulls it in. The smoke is coming from the stairs but there is no fire visible. Continuing
to stay low you make your way down the stairs and the front door is in sight. Just as you are
about to make it to the handle, you start to choke on the hot air and smoke, you reach for the
door but you miss the handle and collapse. As you lay there choking, questions flood your mind.
How did this happen? Why didn't the smoke alarm go off? Where are the firemen? As you fade
in and out due to smoke inhalation, you see a figure, standing outside the windows on the other
side of the house. Then, everything goes black. You awake in a hospital with burning pain affecting a large majority of your body. A policeman arrives and tells you that you have fallen victim
to arson.
Arson is an issue that is not addressed seriously enough in the United States. When arson
occurs and people are injured or killed, there is a full scale investigation that surrounds the crime.

Firemen or Firebugs?, p. 2
However, when it is arson on a vacant home, or small scale arson, the investigation often goes
cold, if it was even started to begin with. There are little to no preventative measures being taken
to try to prevent people from becoming arsonists even though the characteristics of an arson are
very specific and are usually right. The development of an arsonist, is detectable in early stages,
and yet, many still stand by and do nothing. Firefighter arson, is the worst of them all. To believe
you are being protected by someone when they are the very source of the fire, can cause loss of
life, property, and it can even tear a fire department apart. Arson alone is not given enough real
concern, much less would the fire service want to admit that one of their own is a firebug. Therefore, this is often an issue swept under the rug by higher up government officials. Firefighter arson is a serious threat that needs to be stopped.
This affects me personally because I have many friends and family members who are
firefighters and fire debris investigators. I am also a psychology major with a minor in criminal
justice. Therefore I am very interested in the way the mind works and what exact aspects of a
persons life or upbringing make them at a higher risk level of becoming an arsonist. This paper
will discuss the characteristic of arsonists, what measures are, or are not, being taken to prevent
development of future arsonists, and the risks firefighters face every day when dealing with arsonists and the potential issue of firefighter arsonists.
Review of Relevant Literature
Dave Parnell, fire chief of Detroit Fire Department, says that it is beyond him, as to why
someone would want to burn their own city down. In the city of Detroit Michigan the cause of
the majority of fires is arson (Burn 2012.) It is also known that arson accounts for a large amount
of fires in cities across the United States. Arson is a serious offense, but is one that can be detected before the arsonist even makes his first attempt. However, not many arsonists are ever caught

Firemen or Firebugs?, p. 3
or receive jail time, especially if there was no loss of life in the fire (Geller 2008.) While I am in
full agreement about arson being a serious issue, neither of these sources seemed to take into account how many arsonists may actually be in the fire service industry themselves. That threat
alone is more dangerous than any random fire bug out there.
Arsonists are often repeat offenders with a previous criminal record. Their childhood
would have incidences involving harm to small animals or even obsession with fire at a young
age. Collecting lighters, playing with matches, even starting small fires or burning things at a
young age are all signs at an early age that a child could develop into an arsonist (Labree 2010.)
The profile of an arsonist is someone who comes from a broken or disrupted home and and most
likely a male between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five (Ogloff 2009.) There are few known
cases where the arsonist has been a female. Often the arsonist will be interested in, or almost obsessed with the fire industry and may even try to become part of the fire service in whatever way
he can (Arson, 2011.) This profile really shows that arsonists will want to be around the action of
a fire in whatever way he can. The most obvious way to do that is to become a firemen himself.
Every arsonist will try to inject himself into the fire service industry in some way. Unfortunately, there is not as much being done about arson prevention within fire departments today
(Cabe 2000.) Arsonists who are not firemen often create treacherous situations for firemen who
may be responding to the fire due to both the precariousness of burning buildings, and the
amount of fires one arsonist has the potential to set if not stopped promptly (Rosenbaum 2012.)
There are a number of prevention programs for children who have early signs of developing
characteristics of arsonists, however the number of programs are declining due to lack of funding. None of these programs however, are geared towards the prevention of firefighter arson and
there is little to no information provided within the fire service industry to detect firefighter arson

Firemen or Firebugs?, p. 4
and many have simply been caught by intuition of other firemen (Alexander 2001.) However it is
not their fellow firemens responsibility to have to worry about wether any firemen on their department is a firebug. When a firefighter walks into a burning building, they all must have each
others back. If there is any mistrust or tension, millions of things could go wrong inside an unstable burning building.
Entering The Conversation
Although it is known that arson accounts for a large percentage of fires across the country, this issue is not taken seriously enough. This is not only a threat to the people occupying the
house the arson targets, but it is an extreme risk to the firefighters responding to these calls.
When a firefighter responds to a house fire, a preliminary search is conducted. In that preliminary search the firefighter will enter the main pathways of the house and yell for anyone to call
out. If anyone calls out the firefighter will go to that person first and take them out of the house.
The secondary search is conducted for anyone else who may be unconscious or unable to call out
to the fire department and involves knocking down interior doors or obstacles in the way. That
action alone can severely compromise the integrity of the structure and boosts firefighter risk of
loss of life to an even higher number. When firemen are forced to respond to calls in abandoned
buildings, that are often targeted by arsonists, they put themselves at risk of searching for people
who may not even be inside this vacant building, however they must conduct the searches anyways. They do not think twice about it and value the chance of saving one life over the risk of
losing their own. Arsonists are a severe danger not to be taken lightly.
Another aspect of arson is the danger that an arsonist could be within the very structure
that should be protecting us from fire. Fire departments, both volunteer and staffed, are susceptible to firefighter arson. It was not until 2009 that most fire departments stated requiring a crimi-

Firemen or Firebugs?, p. 5
nal background check before being hired on. Even with just a criminal background check many
arsonists can go unnoticed in the hustle and bustle around a fire department. To make fire departments less susceptible to housing firebugs, there should be mandatory psychological screenings done before and during employment at a fire department. Being a firefighter can be a very
stressful job and to hire someone who is psychologically unstable puts the department and even
civilians at risk. Firefighter arson, along with arson in general, are both things to widely thought
about by people as large and or dangerous crimes to the general public. However if it accounts
for such a large amount of all fires, something should be done to minimize the risk. If people are
expecting their lives and property to be protected from firefighters, the risk of arsonist firefighters needs to be eliminated altogether.
Firefighter arson is often overlooked but with psychological exams and more awareness
made to the public and to fire departments themselves, it can be detected at even the earliest
signs. If more information is readily available to the public, parents of children matching the early developmental profile of an arsonist, can have a chance to get the child help before it escalates
or is even old enough to become a firefighter. With psychological tests before and during employment at a fire department, the risk of having an arsonist in the department would be extremely reduced. The criminal background check is not enough, because even if there was something
on their juvenile record, it could be expunged before even beginning the hiring process for a department. If the everyday firemen, not just arson specialists and chiefs, were educated at least
once a year on the profile of a firefighter arsonist, and the qualities they should look for such as
anger issues and an unnatural obsession with open flame, they could have a heightened sense of
awareness that could help prevent firefighter arson all together.
Conclusion/ So-What?

Firemen or Firebugs?, p. 6
Arson, no matter how large or small, is a serious offense. Anything ranging from burning
a field of crops, a car, or a structure, and everything in between is considered arson. No fire that
is intentionally set without boundaries to cause distraction to life or property is arson in my book.
This paper is to draw attention to the severity of the issue of firefighter arson and ways it can potentially be detected and hopefully stopped. While discussing the multitude of recherch done on
arsonists, there was slim to none on firefighter arsonists and how to stop them. I believe that psychological evaluations would be extremely beneficial, not only to prevent firefighter arson, but to
also make sure that there are no unstable firefighters working at a department. If this is not implemented then there will still be no further measures being taken to help detect or deter firefighter arson and it will continue to put civilians and other firefighters in danger. The fact that
firefighter arson is not common knowledge to the public is a problem in and of itself, because the
best chance to stop an arsonist before he becomes a firefighter is to know the signs and be able to
get him the help he needs. This matters because I am sure no one wants the scenario at the beginning of my paper to happen to them. Anyone can fall victim to arson. Firefighter arson only
increases the probability of it happening again because they have readily access to resources and
maps and will know exactly how long it will take for the fire department to get to any location he
is at. If everyone is more aware about firefighter arson, it can be detected and stopped before it
gets worse and sometimes before it even starts.
If further research was one in the firefighter arson area and a profile was developed specifically fore firefighter arson, and not just arsonists in general, that would greatly help in early
detection. Perhaps with more research, why firebugs want to burn down their own city, much
like Dave Parnell said, can be determined. Fire starters, arsonists, and firebugs are all the same
thing and are all equally as dangerous. When more research is done on firefighter arson, there

Firemen or Firebugs?, p. 7
will be more knowledge readily available for the public, firemen, and investigators to catch the
fireman, before he strikes his match again.

References
Burn [Motion picture]. (2012). United States: Callbox LLC.
Geller, J. L. (2008). Firesetting: A burning issue. In R. N. Kocsis (Ed.) , Serial murder and the
psychology of violent crimes (pp. 141-177). Totowa, NJ, US: Humana Press. doi:
10.1007/978-1-60327-049-6_9
Labree, W. (2010). Background and Characteristics of Arsonists. International Journal of Law
and Psychiatry, 33(3), 149-153
Rosenbaum, M. (2012, January 2). Inside The Mind of An Arsonist. ABC News. Retrieved October 9, 2014, from http://abcnews.go.com/US/mind-arsonist-head-los-angeles-firestarters/story?id=15274504
Ogloff, J. (2009). Shedding light on the unfathomable: The psychology of firesetting in the wake
of Victorias bushfire. Australian Psychological Society, April Edition.
Arson. (2011, July 25). Retrieved October 8, 2014, from http://www.fbi.gov/aboutus/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/property-crime/arsonmain.
Alexander, B. (2001, September 1). Juvenile Arson On Steady Rise As Prevention Programs Die.
Retrieved October 10, 2014, from http://sparkaction.org/node/31918
Cabe, K. (2000). Firefighter Arson: Local Alarm. Fire Management, 56(1).