Diversion at the Construction Site

Before dawn one November morning, fires broke out at a highway construction site. Gasoline had been poured into a security guard's pickup truck and ignited, and a second fire began near the tires of a trailer. Two trailers on the site held tens of thousands of pounds of ammonium nitrate and fuel-oil explosives. A trailer exploded, killing six firefighters instantly. More than seven years later, five people were charged. Prosecutors said they had gone to the site to steal equipment and tools and had set the fires as a diversion, and dozens of witnesses testified that the defendants had admitted or boasted about starting the fires. The defendants did not testify. They argued the case rested on uncorroborated admissions and was brought too late, and one blamed a site security guard for the arson.