Arson

Raymond Lee Oyler, the Beaumont mechanic convicted of setting the 2006 Esperanza fire that killed five firefighters, was sentenced to death Friday by a judge who said the serial arsonist had set out to "create havoc." "He became more and more proficient," said Riverside County Superior Court Judge W. Charles Morgan. "He knew young men and women would put their lives on the line to protect people and property, yet he continued anyway."

Los Angeles County sheriff's detectives hope to question a man who was spotted tending a small fire in the vicinity of the Station fire almost one week before that deadly blaze erupted in the Angeles National Forest. At a news conference Monday, homicide detectives requested the public's help in locating a 25-year-old homeless man who was caught "feeding" a small, uncontrolled fire in the early afternoon of Aug. 20 -- six days before the start of the devastating Station fire. The man, Babatunsin Olukunle, a Nigerian national, was reportedly caught tending a fire near mile marker 36 of the Angeles Crest Highway.

Los Angeles County's largest fire in modern history led a pair of California lawmakers Wednesday to step up efforts to win congressional approval of legislation that would set up a national system for tracking convicted arsonists. "We as Californians understand the incalculable damage that can be caused by wildfire, which makes it all the more essential that we do everything possible to prevent unnecessary and senseless disaster at the hand of an arsonist," said Rep. Mary Bono Mack (R-Palm Springs)

After barely a day of deliberation, a Riverside County jury on Wednesday returned a verdict of death for Raymond Lee Oyler for starting the 2006 Esperanza fire in the foothills of the San Jacinto Mountains that killed five firefighters, destroyed 34 homes and charred more than 41,000 acres. Firefighters and the families of the victims hailed the decision and said it offered a measure of justice for a crime they said had torn a hole in the fabric of their lives.

A Caltech graduate student convicted five years ago of conspiracy and arson for vandalizing 125 SUVs has had his arson convictions overturned and his sentence vacated by a federal appeals court. William Cottrell, 29, should have been allowed to present evidence during his 2004 trial that his suffering from Asperger's syndrome prevented him from forming the specific intent to commit the arson attacks, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in an amended opinion this week. Cottrell's conspiracy conviction was upheld, but the 100-month prison sentence imposed on him for all of the offenses was vacated.

Sun Ok Ma looked at a photo of the charred exterior of the sport utility vehicle in which her ex-husband allegedly burned her two children to death, hid her face behind her hair, and wept. The breakdown came as Ma took the witness stand in Los Angeles Superior Court to testify against Dae Kwon Yun, 56. After a two-day preliminary hearing, Yun was ordered Tuesday to stand trial on two counts of murder for the April 2006 deaths of Ashley, 11, and Alexander, 10.

Laborers living on a tiny coffee farm here in western Kenya awoke in the middle of the night last week to an odd light radiating from their huts. At first it seemed like an early sunrise. Then they realized their homes were on fire. "I told my children, 'Now we are dead,' " recalled Rosemary Nasimiyu, 53, who warned her five youngsters not to scream as they fled, so attackers would not shoot them.

The day after a grand jury indicted a Texas Supreme Court justice on arson-related charges, the district attorney here had the case dismissed, arguing there was insufficient evidence to move forward. The unusual action Friday by Harris County Dist. Atty. Chuck Rosenthal in the case against Justice David Medina and his wife outraged two members of the grand jury, who called it a blatant example of politics trumping justice. Both Medina and Rosenthal are Republicans.

An Indiana man charged with starting the Santa Catalina brush fire in May will face two felony counts of recklessly causing a fire, the Los Angeles County district attorney's office said Tuesday. Gary Dennis Hunt, 49, will be brought to Los Angeles this week by arson investigators, and his arraignment is tentatively scheduled for Monday in Long Beach. Hunt was arrested Saturday in Indiana and waived extradition to Los Angeles.

A bizarre legal battle was effectively ended Tuesday when a judge ruled that a grand jury that had indicted a Texas Supreme Court justice over the prosecutor's objections was operating with improperly filed paperwork, the justice's attorney and the grand jury foreman said. The mistake, made when the Harris County district attorney's office extended the grand jury's term in November, invalidated all indictments issued after that, District Judge Jim Wallace ruled.