3 boys torch 2,000 acres

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

A couple of kids started a fire that tore through a sprawling sea of quarter-acre lots in my home county Saturday. Two kids are in custody and a third is expected to be nabbed soon. The little prodigies will probably not be charged as adults.

The local news story.

Here’s imagery that a guy took of the fires and aftermath.

A little background:

Lehigh Acres was the quitessential Florida Land Scam. A vast sea of quarter-acre lots platted from the 50’s through the 70’s. 132,000 lots (I had to count them as part of my job in 2004) with only 50,000 residents. A few years ago 1/5 of those lots were in tax default because no one gave a rats ass about that empty quarter acre grandpa bought in ‘64’. Nowdays, the speculation boom has hit and you’ll see Lehigh Acres being pitched on TV by Eric Estrada.

The result of this is that over 2,000 acres burned and only destroyed 9 homes, 4 sheds and 30 vehicles. No news on how many of those vehicles were on cinder blocks.

2

Why would they be? It sounds like they’re KIDS who played with matches, and had the most unfortunate outcome.

What do you think, they staked out some territory and willfully and malevolently burned it to the ground?

I played with matches a lot when I was a kid; it’s just luck of the draw that I didn’t burn 2000 acres down.

3

I can’t think of any reason to charge them as adults. I was conveying information, not an opinion.