Staff photo / Ed Runyan Keith Logan stands in front of his home on Oak Hill Avenue in Youngstown. Logan, his wife and two daughters escaped from the home early Nov. 23 thanks to his youngest daughter waking him up after seeing the fire on the front porch.

YOUNGSTOWN — Keith Logan is unhappy his family of five was uprooted from their home at 607 Oak Hill Ave. just north of downtown in a 4:17 a.m. Nov. 23 arson.

But he is eternally grateful his 7-year-old daughter’s excitement over newly acquired furniture caused her to wake him up that morning and alert him to the fire.

“I guess it’s just the grace of God the way the events lined up,” he said Thursday from in front of the boarded up, two-story home.

His home was one of seven arsons that took place Nov. 21 to Nov. 25 in the city for which Will A. Jones, 59, is now charged with 18 counts of arson and who sits in the Mahoning County jail. Jones was staying at a halfway house on Willis Avenue at the time of the fires.

“That same evening, me and my family had got a new set of couches and sofas from my brother. So I was going to store them in the garage,” Logan said. “I ended up taking them in the house. The kids loved the couches. They were like ‘Dad we’re going to sleep downstairs.’ Any other night, we all sleep downstairs,” he said.

“I fell asleep downstairs with them. One of my daughters, she is a night owl like myself, at 4 o’clock in the morning, she’s playing (the game) Road Blocks on her phone. But thank God she had the presence of mind to wake me up.

“She says ‘Daddy I hear a noise. I think I see fire outside.’ And I’m waking up. It’s 4 in the morning. I get up. I see flames on the front porch. The couch is on fire. I’m thinking I might possibly be able to put it out. So I go in the house to get the fire extinguisher or water or anything I could maybe extinguish the flame.

“But as I’m looking, I see the flame just caught hold of something,” and the fire grew dramatically. “So I told my daughter, 7 years old, to go upstairs, wake your mom up. Get your sister. At that moment, I’m calling 911. They come downstairs. We all exit safely through the side door,” he said.

The home was destroyed. It’s easy to see through the charred remains of the house that little was spared by the heat and fire that tore through the home, despite the Youngstown Fire Department responding quickly from the downtown fire station.

The family has lost many possessions, including a computer and other equipment Logan used in the music studio and video production studio in the home. His son, who plays sports in the Liberty school district, lost his sports equipment, and a collection of programs and other memorabilia from funeral services for family and friends is also gone.

Logan took lots of photos and kept the photos on backup drives. The fire devastated such items and possibly decades worth of VHS tapes from the 1980s and 1990s that he owned from the former Rayen School on the North Side The family has been staying with family and friends until they can find another home.

There also was a photo — presumed destroyed — of Malcolm Henderson, the man who owned the home before Logan bought it 15 years ago when Henderson was honored for the beautification work he did on the home and its property. The photo and a news article in the The Vindicator documented Henderson’s achievements.

Logan also had memorabilia from the homecoming celebration at Youngstown State University at which he became the first African American homecoming king, Logan said. “They all lost a lot of stuff,” he said of his wife and kids.

THE MAIN POSITIVE

Despite what the Logan family has lost, Keith holds onto his memory of how he felt after he and all three of the family members who were home with him that morning stood together outside, safe from the flames and smoke. His son was not home at the time.

“The main positive that I took away from the whole thing is — we were standing out here with a Red Cross blanket. We all had pajamas on. I see my entire family unscathed, unburned, obviously devastated. But it’s just that they were all alive. It meant a lot more to me than any of the material things.”

He said the destroyed reminders of his kids growing up “definitely mean a lot to me. Every day you realize things that you cannot get back,” he said, with his home behind him.

THE THREE HOUSES

Youngstown fire investigator Charles Hodge and Youngstown fire reports provide new information about the three arsons that occurred at homes on the South Side — the Logan home on Oak Hill Avenue Nov. 23, a home at 203 W. Woodland Ave. Nov. 23 and one at 27 Willis Ave. Nov. 22. The Willis Avenue home is where Jones was living at the time in the Carter House Men’s Recovery House.

One thing that is significant about all three home fires is that people were home in all three. There were eight of Jones’ fellow residents of the Carter house when that fire began at 4:16 a.m, Nov. 22. One minor injury occurred. Officials say Jones was not there when firefighters arrived. That fire damaged a front porch.

The arson on Woodland took place about one-half block east of the fire on Oak Hill Avenue and on the same day as the Oak Hill fire. One can see part of the Woodland home from the side yard of the Oak Hill home.

The fire on Woodland Avenue was reported at 10:47 p.m. Nov. 23 — about 18 hours after the Oak Hill fire.

The Woodland fire began in a garage behind the house and spread to the back of the house, destroying the garage and charring the back of the house. Hodge said two people were home during the Woodland Avenue blaze.

“It belongs to a senior citizen, who was in her room when her garage was set on fire,” Logan said of the Woodland Avenue fire. “This was the same day. Mine happened at (4:17 a.m.) Hers was at (10:47 p.m.). Her situation started with her garage and spread to her house. But in both situations, people are sleeping in their homes,” he said.

In the case of the fire at his house, if it would have happened on a school night or any other night when the whole family was upstairs sleeping, the whole family may have been killed. The fire at his house was on a Sunday morning.

Hodge said that Jones apparently did not have any connection to Youngstown, and he was sent to the city to spend time in a halfway house after being released from prison in late July. He had just finished a nine-year sentence for an arson in Cleveland.

The Vindicator found Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court records showing that Jones was convicted of setting a fire on Guthrie Avenue in Cleveland Aug. 3, 2016. He was sentenced to nine years in prison in 2017 on arson-related offenses.

Logan was asked if it bothers him to think the person who set fire to his front porch probably knew that people were home and that his actions might kill people.

He agreed that the home would have appeared to be occupied because of vehicles on the property. He said the arsonist may have also seen the “flicker of a television.”

He said, “I shuffled through most of the emotions and feelings — ranging from anger to the other end of the spectrum.” He said if the person who committed these crimes has mental health problems, he hopes the person gets help.

But when people express anger around him over the fire, he tells them, “God will deal with that in the long run. God has assured me that by having all of my family safe.”

When the roof of Logan’s front porch collapsed, it fell on a Youngstown Fire Department captain and another firefighter, according to a YFD report. Both firefighters were able to “self-extricate” from the collapse. The captain was seen by ambulance personnel, but he did not need to be transported to the hospital, the report states.

Jones remains in the Mahoning County jail in lieu of $450,000 bond after waiving a preliminary hearing on his 18 charges in Youngstown Municipal Court on Dec. 5. His case was bound over to a Mahoning County grand jury, which has not yet acted on the charges. If he is convicted of the 14 counts of aggravated arson — one for each person who was present in the three home arson fires — Jones could get more than 100 years in prison.

WILLIS FIRE

According to a Youngstown Fire Department report on the fire at 4:16 a.m. Nov. 22 on Willis Avenue, firefighters were sent to the two-story home and saw light smoke and residents on the front curb.

Remnants of a chair were on the front sidewalk leading to the steps in the front of the home. There was heavy soot and smoke damage to the front porch, along with some fire damage to the siding on the enclosed front patio. The chair appeared to have been originally on the porch and was dragged outside by a resident, the report states.

The resident suffered minor burns to his arm and leg that did not require transport to the hospital. A water can was used on the chair and areas of the patio, and smoke and soot was pushed into the home when the front door to the “actual residence” was opened and the chair was removed from the patio, the report adds. There appeared to be no damage to the second floor.

The names of the eight residents of the home were collected by firefighters. Hodge said Jones was not among the residents who were there. Hodge said he was notified of the fire, but he did not respond to the scene during the early morning hours, waiting until about 9 a.m., when it was daylight.

The fire report noted surveillance cameras on the property, including one aimed at the front door “directly toward the suspected area of origin. Lighter fluid (with top opened) was collected from the area adjacent (to) the chair” and was collected for evidentiary reasons, the report adds. There was “no odor of accelerant,” the report states.

It appeared the fire did not do any structural damage to the home or damage the exterior, the report states. Ambulance personnel left the scene after treating two residents with minor injuries.

VEHICLE ARSONS

Two vehicle-related arsons were reported the same day as the Willis Avenue fire. Criminal complaints against Jones filed in Youngstown Municipal Court state that both vehicle fires damaged the interior of the vehicles, causing more than $1,000 of damage to each. Other details on those fires were not available.

Other vehicle fires occurred closer to the time Jones was arrested, which was about 4:30 p.m. Nov. 26 at the Western Reserve Transit Authority bus station, 340 W. Federal St. downtown. Jones was taken to the Youngstown Police Department and admitted to committing the three house fires and several car fires, according to court documents.

Among the car fires was one reported at 2:03 p.m. Nov. 26 in the back of Geo’s Music, a record store downtown, where the vehicle owned by record store owner, musician and disc jockey George Case, was damaged by fire. The fire was out when firefighters arrived. The car showed signs of smoke and heat damage to the interior, a fire report states.

Lydia Sandoval created a GoFundMe page on Case’s behalf. It states that his vehicle was vandalized in the fire. “I walked out of my garage to unload my band equipment to find that the inside of my Suburban had been set on fire,” Case stated.

“I was not the only victim. After filing a police report it was revealed that another car (nearby) was set on fire, along with a couple of homes.” Case stated that between band equipment and the cost of the vehicle, he believed his loss will exceed $20,000.

“Replacing this will be overwhelming and has set me back tremendously.” The vehicle had only liability insurance, he stated.

On Dec. 6, the GoFundMe page updated readers by saying that Case traveled to South Carolina to buy a replacement vehicle.

Another of the vehicle fires Jones is charged with setting was the 3:54 a.m. Nov. 23 fire at 219 W. Federal Street downtown near the Draught House, where the owner said he used a fire extinguisher to put out the fire before firefighters arrived. The fire was contained to the driver’s area and middle console. Damage to the vehicle was estimated at $2,000.

And on Nov. 25, a vehicle fire was reported at 4:20 a.m. at 25 Ridge Ave. off Market Street, just south of downtown, where firefighters found the cab of a truck on fire in a parking lot adjacent to a church.

The vehicle’s owner was trying to put out the fire with buckets of water. The vehicle was a cab only, no body, fenders or bed and had a trailer attached.

Firefighters completed putting out the fire. The owner said he purchased the truck several years earlier for restoration.

Hodge said Thursday he cannot discuss specifics of the investigation right now, such as what led him to consider Jones a “person of interest” in multiple arsons Nov. 26 when he spotted Jones at the bus station and called for assistance from the YPD to arrest Jones. Adult Parole Authority officers were the first ones there to make the arrest.

Hodge was a Youngstown firefighter for 12 years, fighting fires before becoming the fire investigator. When asked if he had been involved with cases in which a person is alleged to have committed multiple fires like this, he said he had but not as the fire investigator.

He said this case has made for “a long three weeks.”