DELTONA -- The smell of gasoline carrying through an open bedroom window at 4 a.m. Saturday woke a Deltona woman and prompted her to look outside for the source.
She saw a man walking in the street in front of her house with a gas can in hand and she decided to call the Sheriff’s Office. Responding deputies nabbed 19-year-old Justin Szymczyk just seven minutes after the woman called and charged him with arson upon discovering a utility trailer filled with gasoline-soaked yard debris.
"When deputies and fire marshal investigators from Deltona and the state interviewed Szymczyk, they learned he was connected to several other arson fires in the area and as a result will face additional charges," Sheriff's spokesman Gary Davidson said.
Deputies responded to Falmouth Avenue to look for the suspicious man and found him crouching behind a boat that was beside a house, hoping to hide from the deputy. When the deputy approached, Szymczyk took off running only to be captured by a second deputy, Davidson said.
Once Szymczyk was secured, deputies noticed the strong smell of gasoline coming from a utility trailer full of yard debris. Deputies notified the owner, Tracy Cochran, who lived at 1444 Falmouth Ave. This wasn’t the first time Cochran’s trailer was targeted, having been set on fire July 22. Cochran also noticed that Szymczyk had used Cochran’s gas can Saturday that had been sitting in the bed of his truck. Szymczyk later admitted to setting the July fire and it was also determined that he was likely connected to more than a dozen other similar fires in Deltona, Davidson said.
Szymczyk was charged with arson, prowling and resisting arrest without violence for the Saturday incident. Deltona and state fire marshals, who have been investigating the previous fires, anticipate filing additional charges. Szymczyk, a Deltona resident, was transported to the Volusia County Branch Jail in Daytona Beach .