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"We kept running over and over in our head, 'What could have happened? "Sometimes when we opened up in the morning, the fire department would already be here," Singh says.With the exception of home improvement, Sweatt's firesetting and voyeurism were the only activities that brought him any happiness. This case was filed in Orange County Superior Courts, Central Justice Center located in Orange, California. And, glad to hear these stories are of interest to you. In his letters to me from prison, Sweatt often would ask how "Scott" and "Bob" were doing, expressing nothing but respect and gratitude toward the investigators who had put him away.Sweatt signed a secret guilty plea within two weeks of his arrest. View the profiles of professionals named "Thomas Sweatt" on LinkedIn. Story: When Thomas Sweatt saw an attractive man, he would follow him home, but instead of talking to the object of his affection, Sweatt would set fire to the man's house or car. Investigators visited nearby businesses hoping to find any video recordings that might offer clues to the fire. 0 Reputation Score Range. Never before had a detective questioned Sweatt about any of them.After sentencing, Sweatt was quickly sent to the United States Penitentiary at Terre Haute, the famously rough prison where Timothy McVeigh was put to death. I agreed to meet with him and Cheryl the following afternoon at a coffee shop in the bustling Palisades Mall in Nyack.The life of the Picott family had just two chapters: Before the fire and after. Smiths Medical. 0 Add Rating Anonymously. Sweatt often tossed incendiary devices into police cars and then watched them burn. I kept them hid as you stated in your letter. Some lunatic did it. They saw a strange man sitting on their front porch. Thomas Sweatt was one of the worst arsonists ever. On February 14, 2002, Ms. Brown was pronounced dead. The Picott children told me there's an even simpler reason they considered the official line nonsense: Nobody in the house smoked cigarettes. "The cause of the fire may have been settled, but the letter held a separate mystery. "He just wanted it over with." Then I'd masterbate over the fire while driving away from the schene. "It's not like he's walking around," he said. As a stipulation of any plea agreement that might be offered, the government insisted that investigators be able to interview Sweatt about his motives. The sight of a cruiser could make him feel powerless and slighted, so he torched them around town.I burned police cruisers parked at the station and some that were at their residence. As Fulkerson staked him out at the KFC one day, he watched from his unmarked car as Sweatt walked outside the restaurant, got down on his knees, and started scraping stale gum from the cracks in the sidewalk.After not seeing any activity that would tie Sweatt to the fires, Fulkerson and a D.C. detective walked into the KFC to interview him. Then on Valentine's Day, he lit one of his devices on the stairwell of an apartment building on Blair Road just over the District line in Montgomery County, where investigators had never followed him. A car captured on video leaving the scene of a fire had been traced back to a man who lived right around the corner from the Circle 7 store on Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue. Jonathan lives in Maryland with his wife, Carrie and sons, Shepard & Weston. Add Thomas' birthday or the date he died to see a list of historic events that occurred during Thomas' lifetime. ATF led a task force comprised of police and fire departments in Washington, DC and surrounding communities in Maryland and Virginia. Sweatt hadn't been considered a suspect in that fire until investigators discovered a news clip about the blaze in his apartment.One of Sweatt's only requests was to meet Blackwell, the task force spokesman who had addressed Sweatt through the media. Author Robert M Luckett Discusses Thomas Sweatt and Solving for X on Crime Binge Podcast on iheartradio. Some involved police and some I took matters in my own hand.It really goes all the way back to childhood -- never felt loved by family and even now I say I love them but its very hard to feel in my heart. I liked that, but no matter what good, nice things people said I never felt better. The vapors ignited in the front hallway, and smoke started pouring out beneath the door. Sweatt pleaded guilty to 45 fires and was sentenced to life in prison without a chance of parole. Is Thomas E Sweatt Jr. reachable by email? One of the most prolific arsonists in American history, Sweatt set over 350 fires in and around Washington, D. Thomas Sweatt - Top podcast episodes Instead I wanted to play house out in the woods making straw houses, pretending to be the lady next door and dare my brothers to enter my house without knocking!! The official fire report at the time mistakenly blamed a dropped cigarette for the reason the fire started. I sat there a long time trying to get my nerves together because this was a huge house and wasn't quiet sure it would burn. Of course I see Evart St each and every night, he wrote, in reference to the fire that killed Jones. "About a year and a half ago, I sent a letter to Sweatt at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Ind. Considering how long he got away with setting so many treacherous fires, investigators would come to place Sweatt among the most prolific and dangerous arsonists in American memory. So, after leaving the Clubs + bars he would take me home and ask if I needed the car for the next day. '"About a year ago, a D.C.-area detective had reached out to Rodney. Get the full experience. I was 50 years old with about 15 years service. Thomas A. Sweatt is a convicted serial arsonist. By accepting our use of cookies, your data will be aggregated with all other user data. We need your support in this difficult time. She later said, "Now when I look at my body, I see it differently. Their man had already disappeared. Picotts son, Rodney Picott, a police officer in New York, said in a recent interview that investigators had told him in 2005 that Sweatt had confessed to setting the fire that killed his parents, and Picott accepted that it would not become part of the formal charges. It's dated the same day as the fire, even though much of the house was destroyed. I regret this fire because it was an elder man reside there. "The fastest we'd ever seen," says Fulkerson. As with most sociopaths, he likes to brag about what he did and how he did it., U.S. District Judge Deborah K. Chasanow appeared to understand that Sweatts sentencing hearing felt incomplete. He worked at the KFC at the corner of New York Avenue and Bladensburg Road in Northeast, where he'd come on board in 1993. In exchange for his full accounting, Sweatt agreed to be imprisoned for life plus 136 years on a selected number of offenses he admitted to in court. 1.51 3.44 /5. The gate was closed and a placard warned against trespassing.The family never returned to the house after it burned. There's still hope for us all no matter where we are -- This old mortal body will soon be no more but the soul will go to heaven or hail. He also learned the name of the deceased: Bessie Mae Duncan.Sweatt was saddened to learn of Duncan's death, but in his mind she was simply the collateral damage he had to incur in service to his fantasies. What the officials didn't know at the time was that they stood before the cameras expressly because an admirer had summoned them. I don't look to have a romantic relationship as a normal human being would -- love, roses + red wine sort of thing. In 2003, the Washington, DC area experienced 14 suspiciously similar incendiary house fires. He would go on to torch Washington steadily for another 20 years, and he would claim more lives than Duncan's before his arrest in April 2005. Everything he did was so neat -- he knew where everything was.He'd bring in coffee and doughnuts for everyone in the morning. View Actual Score Check Background . Sweatt, a native of Houston's Third Ward, had been a standout student at Wiley College, the historically black, private college in Marshall, Texas . Thomas Sweatt has been working as a Director, Corporate Accounts at Smiths Medical for 4 years. Why? (Rodney knew this as well as Sweatt did, since he visited the vacant house whenever he was in D.C.) And there was another detail that Sweatt offered independent of the Post report -- the funeral for Bessie Mae Duncan, which Sweatt claimed was at McGuire Funeral Service on Georgia Avenue, near the Maryland line. Even during visits they pretend also I know because its all the expression on their faces that tells me so, and even on the phone. "There's a learning curve like anything else," says Scott Fulkerson, an agent with ATF who served as one of the lead investigators on the case. So you see, it doesn't always had to be the type of house but the cars + trucks parked in the driveway can become a phantasy. You mentioned small + safe fires. The city was classifying more than 200 fires per year as acts of arson as far back as the early '90s, compared with about a third of that number today.After he bought a used Toyota in 2001, Sweatt started to venture beyond Southeast. Like the house on Anacostia Ave, I sat there so long that the occupants drove pass and saw me sitting on their porch. "Thomas Sweatt: Inside the Mind of D.C.'s Most Notorious Arsonist" i. s also available in # ebook format. That feeling may have stemmed from the minor brushes he'd had with them in the past. It could be 21 minutes before the jug's plastic melted, allowing the gasoline and its accompanying vapors to spread across the porch. And then I drive across the street to the Fire Station and tape them also -- mostly close-up (Not fat or out of shape workers, but built muscular and nice feet) this you can't understand because these are some of the phantasy.He set fire to recruiter stations as far away as Richmond. My mind started to think of evil thing to do in that neighborhood. Add to Cart. A light snow dusted the streets. He must have been too panicked to register his injuries: He was screaming that his wife was still inside. Investigators started to think their arsonist was a jarhead. He never forgot the rejection. The first offense occurred at approximately 4:05am on Tuesday, February 5, 2002. Find out where Thomas Sweatt was born, their birthday and details about their professions, education, religion, family and other life details and facts. Paskelbta 2022-06-04 Autorius hacker wallpaper 4k ultra hd Were fascinated by the craft you created and the complexity and longevity that youve done fires, Fulkerson said. Investigators put cameras in both stores and started what they called the "Black Bag Operation." Leave your condolences to the family on this memorial page or send flowers to show you care. He passed the aptitude test but failed the physical. An autopsy performed by the DC Office of the Chief Medical Examiner determined the cause of death to be smoke inhalation and the manner of death to be a homicide. . Unbeknownst to Sweatt, Picott underwent a series of surgeries at Washington Hospital Center in a vain effort to save him. Agents from the Naval Criminal Investigative Services (NCIS) couldn't offer them DNA profiles of current Marines, but they did have a couple of leads on old barracks-related car fires. that tend to call the most famous people YouTube stars or Reality TV stars, we've decided to mark fame as a persons importance in history. Members of the Fifth District received a radio assignment for a house fire at 1208 Montello Avenue NE. There's no more guessing. He pled guilty to 45 fires and received life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. The case status is Not Classified By Court. {{ post.roar_specific_data.api_data.analytics }}. "He'd be there at 6 a.m. every morning doing inventory. LOW HIGH. Fulkerson remembers asking himself. He is currently serving his sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution in Terre Haute, Indiana. He apologized to the families of the victims, telling them, I share your hurt, and asking, for those who cant forgive him, that God replace the hate with understanding that time will heal.. This week on Crime Binge the girls discuss Thomas Sweatt, a serial arsonist who was responsible for at least 353 fires. Neighbors gathered in front of the house as officials sorted the wreckage, and they broke into sobs when the body was found inside the house around dawn. She'd been asphyxiated by smoke, her feet burned from trying to escape.Investigators assumed the arsonist saw his fires in the news. Subject: Thomas Sweatt (Serial arsonist) Wed Apr 01, 2015 10:01 pm: Thomas A. Sweatt is a convicted serial arsonist, who was possibly the most prolific arsonist in Bio - Tracking Thomas Sweatt : Author Robert M. Luckett When the nearby school let out in the afternoon the kids would pile through the door and tear the place up, complicating things by ordering pizzas (it was a KFCnPizza Hut hybrid). He pled guilty to 45 fires and received life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. Thomas Sweatt, 50, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court to first-degree murder in the death of Lou Edna Jones, 86, who died of smoke inhalation from a fire in her Washington home in June 2003 . Jonathan Riffe has been involved in the fire service since 1996. I'm glad to know God is a forgiven God and "there is no sin so great He will not forgive." Some homes were rowhouses, others were detached; most bore aluminum siding, but others were brick; a few were large apartment buildings, others single-family. Gulzar Singh, the owner of the liquor store, Syd's Drive-In, says he often arrived to work only to find the smoldering carcasses of automobiles in his parking lot. During the nearly two-year investigation, the task force was able to link 50 fires to a single serial arsonist and ultimately identified Thomas Sweatt as the prime suspect. He reported false fires on his block just to bring the engines out. Physical objects themselves had a way of stirring his feelings, sometimes more than people. "With the cooperation of the owner of the two Circle 7 stores, agents affixed thumbnail-size stainless steel chips to the bottom of every bag in both stores. Once it did, the fire would reach the wood or aluminum siding. Letters From an Arsonist. If one of the bags were to be involved in a fire, the chip would survive. Over time, firesetting, like sex, can grow old within its conventions. ***Jones never made it out of her bedroom above the front porch. June 3, 2022 . As far as psychological profiling goes, they were nearly spot-on. Give him his time to shine. "He's right about too much," Rodney said -- like the fact that the house remained a shell for years. He later admitted to a lot more fires during a proffer session with the arson task force as part . "It's amazing that I remember that phrase.It's etched in my memory." [There's no cigarette] left burning. Thomas Sweatt. Behind the mask of this crazy, perverted, demented, killer serial arsonist is Thomas Sweatt, an African American homosexual loner in his late fifties who worked at various fast-food joints throughout his lifetime and turned Washington, DC, upside down into a living hell. I parked exactly in front of this house and watched -- when firetrucks came I moved around and just watched afar off. "Sweatt answered with a question of his own: "Why would I set those beautiful homes on fire when I'm trying to become a homeowner myself? Vito Maggiolo, a spokesman for the D.C. fire department, remembers the fire well. )For Sweatt, different fires grew out of different feelings -- many out of a sense of powerlessness, others out of spite, some even out of love -- but more than anything else, his decades-long rampage was about sexual fantasy:Why did I set the fires when I set them?