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A Spokane man with a manslaughter conviction has been arrested and charged with first-degree arson for allegedly setting the largest of three wildfires that have destroyed hundreds of homes and forced about 67,000 people to evacuate.
Getting into it: Aaron Farinacci, 37, was taken into custody Monday with help from a SWAT team after detectives secured warrants for his arrest and for a search of his Spokane home. He is being held on a $1 million bond in the Spokane County Jail.
The case started with a tip. A witness told police they spotted a man staring up into the trees near the Old Trails Fire not long before it broke out Saturday, then saw him hunched down in the grass along the roadway. The man “stood up and looked very nervous” and left the area, Sheriff John Nowels said. Deputies picked Farinacci up that same day roughly half a mile from the fire’s origin point, found him carrying waterproof matches and a butane lighter, questioned him, and let him go. By Sunday, major crimes detectives had linked him back to the scene and “determined that the origin of the fire was indeed exactly where the witnesses had seen Mr. Farinacci kneeling in the grass.”
Farinacci denied setting the fire and told deputies he had the matches and lighter because he smokes.
The three fires, Old Trails, Fairview, and Autumn Lane, have burned more than 8,000 acres and were 0% contained as of Tuesday morning. Officials estimate 700 structures destroyed with another 400 still unassessed.
Governor Bob Ferguson called it “likely the worst natural disaster in Spokane history” and has issued a statewide ban on outdoor fires. Trump approved an expedited emergency declaration after the state’s congressional delegation requested it. No one has been confirmed dead or injured, though authorities are still trying to reach 14 people by phone, down from nearly 300 initial missing person reports.
This all comes as Nowels says investigators have not tied Farinacci to either of the remaining two fires, which remain under investigation, and as forecasters warn conditions will worsen Wednesday with rising winds and temperatures in the 90s.
