WEST JORDAN, Utah, Oct. 24, 2022 (Gephardt Daily) — A West Jordan man has been booked into jail after allegedly burning the house of older relatives with whom he was staying, with them asleep inside.
Preston Maurice Castleberry, 22, faces two counts of aggravated arson, a first-degree felony, and purchase, transfer, possession or use of a firearm by a restricted person, a third-degree felony. He was arrested on Oct. 19.
The fire
On Oct. 14 at 4:28 a.m., fire crews were called to a blaze in the area of 7000 South and 2400 West. Arriving firefighters saw flames burning in the basement of the house.
The two older residents, a male and a female, had made it out safe, but “were frantic as they believed (Castleberry) was still in the home. Fire personnel made entry into the residence through the unlocked front door to search for Preston,” Castleberry’s arrest documents say.
“Fire personnel observed there was a large fire in the basement of the residence, but they did not locate Preston. Fire personnel were able to extinguish the fire in the basement and conducted a thorough search to verify no one else was in the home.”
The basement
Firefighters did find an open notebook in the basement with a written message, which a firefighter recalled as saying something like “you all think I’m crazy, I’m not crazy and demons in my head,” his probable cause statement says.
The couple told investigators that as they fled the house, they “observed, in the hallway in front of their bedroom door and the only exit from their room, a box containing different bottles and liquids in the center of the hallway. (They) stated the box was burning, the unknown liquids in the bottles were boiling, and smoke was above them in the hallway.”
The box had been placed directly in the path to the exit, the statement says. The couple escaped by crawling to an exit, and the male pushed or pulled the box out to the yard.
The couple also told investigators that Castleberry had been “acting strange lately, that he had been staying completely isolated and would not even acknowledging (them) when they spoke to him.”
The box of bubbling substances the man had pulled from his residence contained “glass bottles filled with an unknown substance, believed to be an accelerant, what appeared to be a cloth wick which was burned, or partially burned, inserted into each bottle.”
Similar mason jars were found near Castleberry’s bed.
The arrest
An initial ping on Castleberry’s phone provided no location, but the phone was later turned on, and its location was near a cell tower in Taylorsville. West Jordan police found the suspect in a church parking lot.
“Preston was arrested and, during a search incident to arrest, detectives located a loaded firearm in Preston’s backpack as well as marijuana THC products,” his probable cause statement says. “Preston was also in possession of numerous matchbooks and additional firearm ammunition.”
“Upon meeting with Preston in custody at the West Jordan Justice Center, his behaviors and speech were consistent with persons under the influence of recently ingested controlled substances, such as those found within his backpack,” the statement says.
Castleberry was ordered to be held without bail in the Salt Lake County jail system.
