ST. GEORGE — A woman faces first-degree felony arson after she turned herself into police for allegedly setting fire to a residence on Main Street in LaVerkin earlier this month.
On Saturday, officers found a woman waiting in the lobby of the LaVerkin City Police Department. When the officer asked her if everything was OK, she allegedly said she wasn’t and that “she needed to turn herself in because she started a house on fire,” the officer wrote in an affidavit filed in support of the arrest.
Police say the woman, later identified as 26-year-0ld Devon Ryan Robinson, said she was referring to the fire initially reported on the afternoon of May 13 when emergency personnel were dispatched to a structure fire at a single-family residence on Main Street in LaVerkin.
The fire was spotted by a passerby who saw flames as they drove by the residence. They then called 911 to report it. When firefighters arrived, they found the home, situated on a property surrounded by dense vegetation, unoccupied, and crews began battling the blaze.
The fire burned through the home and caused an estimated $75,000 in damages, Hurricane Valley Fire District Deputy Chief Kevin Gildea told St. George news on May 14, one day after the fire. He said the blaze started in a bedroom, but the cause was still under investigation at the time of the report.
On Saturday, after Robinson’s alleged confession at the police station, she was taken into an interview room where, according to the statement, she told the officer the fire started on the bed in one of the bedrooms on the southeast side of the home, information that was consistent with what was found during the fire investigation.
Police say Robinson said she set the house on fire by pouring Patron Tequila on the bedding and igniting both the bedding and the bed on fire using a lighter, adding that she said she started the fire because “she was tired of being stolen from,” the officer recounted in the report.
Robinson was arrested and transported to Purgatory Correctional Facility facing first-degree felony arson, due to the fire being set in a habitable structure, the officer wrote.
Robinson’s bail was set at $20,000.
Ed. Note: A new Utah law generally prohibits the release of arrest booking photos until after a conviction is obtained.
This report is based on statements from court records, police or other responders and may not contain the full scope of findings. Persons arrested or charged are presumed innocent until found guilty in a court of law or as otherwise decided by a trier-of-fact.
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