Clay Today staff
ORANGE PARK – Police say a woman evicted from her Orange Park apartment started a weekend fire that caused an estimated $500,000 in damage.
No tenants were injured in the Sunday, Dec. 21, fire at The Bluff House Apartments on Wells Road, the Clay County Sheriff’s Office said. However, a firefighter was treated at the scene for exposure to heat and steam.
The blaze, which was reported shortly 7 a.m., gutted two apartments at the 2020 Wells Road complex and heavily damaged two others. All were vacant, the Sheriff’s Office said.
The fire spread quickly enough that Clay County Fire Rescue issued a second alarm for more manpower after units arriving at 7:16 a.m. found a bottom unit well involved in flames and the fire moving into a second apartment, Chief Frank Ennist said.
Additional firefighters, including a crew from Jacksonville Fire Rescue, responded and brought the blaze under control at 7:40 a.m., Ennist said in a prepared release.
Patrice Nigel Plummer, 31, is charged with arson causing bodily harm, burglary and arson to a structure, all felonies, and misdemeanor trespassing, according to a Sheriff’s Office arrest report. The office manager told police that Plummer had been evicted from the apartment where the fire started and that some of her belongings remained inside. Plummer also had been issued a trespass warning on Dec. 17 after being found in the complex following the eviction, the report says.
Additional apartments within the fire building were affected by the loss of power, but did not sustain any fire or smoke damage, Ennist said.
Plummer was arrested after coming onto the property after the fire was put out, the report says. Items Plummer may have used to set the blaze were recovered from a nearby dumpster, the report says.
January 12th 2009 - 12:41PM