The Arsonist Next Door | 2: Smoke and Mirrors

Summary

**Summary of "The Binge Crimes: The Arsonist Next Door"
Episode: 2: Smoke and Mirrors
Release Date: May 8, 2025
Host/Author: Sony Music Entertainment

Introduction

In the second episode of The Arsonist Next Door, titled Smoke and Mirrors, reporter Sam Anderson delves deeper into the mysterious arson spree that terrorized Phoenix in the year 2000. This episode unpacks the intricate web of fear, suspicion, and betrayal that ensued as both neighbors and law enforcement grappled with the relentless attacks on homes near the cherished mountain preserves.

Ken Williams: A Local's Tale

Ken Williams, a Phoenix local originally from New Jersey, shares his harrowing firsthand experience of witnessing one of the arsons. Describing himself as a "kind uncle" with a "square jaw" and "bright blue eyes," Ken recounts the night he saw flames engulf his neighbor's home.

Ken Williams ([03:35]): "I was just cooking up some chicken, some steaks on the grill for the family, and I see an orange glow reflecting off my backyard window. And I turn around, I go, oh, my God, a fire. I could see the flames shooting up into the sky."

Danielle Sink ([07:19]): "We had takeout from this wonderful little place called Chino Bandito."

Driving Sam and producer Leona to the scene, Ken vividly describes the chaos and the immediate realization that this was part of a coordinated arson campaign.

The Investigation Begins: Lieutenant Rob Handy

Lieutenant Rob Handy of the Phoenix Police Department opens the investigation, initially suspecting a known anti-development hermit. However, surveillance reveals the prime suspect was actually at home during the latest fire, leading to a significant setback.

Rob Handy ([05:15]): "We were scared. We were scared for the community. Or scared what was going to happen."

A witness later identifies a suspicious middle-aged man with glasses at the fire scene, prompting the use of a sketch artist to create a composite image.

Danielle Sink: A Victim of Arson

Danielle Sink, a doctor and mother of three, becomes a poignant figure in the narrative. Her new home, symbolizing her family's success and dreams, falls victim to the arson spree just as Christmas approaches.

Danielle Sink ([08:38]): "I can walk out my front door and I can get onto the mountain and have a view across all the city and imagine all the people's lives going on in the twinkling lights."

The destruction of her house not only devastates her family but also intensifies fears within the community about the arsonist's next move.

Escalation and FBI Involvement

As the fires continue, Lieutenant Handy faces mounting pressure and resource constraints. Recognizing the severity of the situation, he reluctantly seeks assistance from the FBI, leading to the formation of a joint task force.

Rob Handy ([15:06]): "Within a couple weeks, we had swelled from 10 to 15 people working on it to about 40 or 50."

Ken Williams, revealed to be an FBI special agent, is persuaded to join the task force despite his initial reluctance due to another critical case involving a terrorist organization.

Challenges Within the Task Force

The expanded team includes seasoned agents like Special Agent Terry Kearns, but despite increased resources—such as SWAT teams and advanced surveillance—the investigation stalls. The only tangible lead, the composite sketch resembling Ken himself, adds a layer of irony and internal conflict.

Ken Williams ([21:45]): "When I saw the composite sketch, I said, you know, that's me. This witness is describing me."

Efforts to crowdsource information through a tip line result in thousands of leads, most of which lead nowhere, highlighting the investigators' struggle to pinpoint the elusive arsonist.

Danielle Sink's Tragedy and Community Paranoia

The episode poignantly illustrates the impact on victims like Danielle Sink and the broader community’s descent into paranoia. Danielle's realization that her home is destroyed underscores the personal toll of the arson spree.

Danielle Sink ([12:35]): "The mountain looked pristine and my lot was just a burned out black apocalypse in the middle of this beautiful neighborhood."

Scott Meyer and Don't Waste Arizona

Scott Meyer, an environmental activist running Don't Waste Arizona, becomes another focal point. His dedication to combating pollution and his aggressive legal actions inadvertently make him a suspect in the eyes of the FBI.

Scott Meyer ([32:45]): "What you're looking for is somebody in the neighborhood who is upset about these new homes are coming up and ruining his view. You're looking for a local."

Despite his team's frustrations with the FBI's misdirected suspicions, Scott vehemently denies any involvement with the arson attacks, emphasizing his focus on fighting polluters rather than opposing residential development.

Scott Meyer ([35:57]): "We know about the fires, but we have nothing to do with them."

Investigation Stalemate and Community Strain

With each new development, the investigation faces dead ends. The team’s resources are stretched thin, leading to increased tensions and stress among the agents and their families.

Rob Handy ([14:22]): "We really felt like we're losing control of this thing."

Community members become increasingly distrustful, suspecting neighbors of arson without substantial evidence, which exacerbates the sense of insecurity and fear.

** nearing Conclusion: Pressures Mount**

As the episode draws to a close, the investigation remains unresolved, and the strain on both the investigators and the community intensifies. A significant blow occurs when a promising lead is abruptly dropped, signaling that the arsonist remains one step ahead.

Rob Handy ([17:22]): "When I saw the composite sketch, I said, you know, that's me. This witness is describing me."

Sam Anderson teases the next episode, hinting at a journalist’s breakthrough that could potentially unravel the mystery surrounding the arsonist.

Notable Quotes

• Ken Williams ([19:08]): "He came, we stood at the car, and we literally shook hands and agreed how we would work this thing over the trunk of a car in the middle of the night."

• Danielle Sink ([09:30]): "Burn injuries are just kind of a horrifying thing. And so people who have very serious burns spend years getting multiple surgeries to recover from. It's just foolish and dangerous and cruel to put somebody through that."

• Terry Kearns ([26:01]): "In my career, just over 20 years, there was probably only one or two times I had a case where there wasn't a skeleton in the closet."

Conclusion

Smoke and Mirrors effectively paints a picture of a community under siege by fear and suspicion, with its bonds tested by the relentless arson attacks. The episode underscores the complexities of criminal investigations, especially when internecine suspicion and limited leads hinder progress. As the task force grapples with internal challenges and external pressures, the quest to unmask the arsonist remains fraught with obstacles, setting the stage for further revelations in subsequent episodes.

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Attributions:

• Hosts and Speakers:

  • Sam Anderson – Reporter and Narrator
  • Ken Williams – Local Resident and FBI Special Agent
  • Lieutenant Rob Handy – Phoenix Police Department
  • Danielle Sink – Doctor and Victim
  • Scott Meyer – Environmental Activist, Don't Waste Arizona
  • Special Agent Terry Kearns – FBI Task Force Leader

• Production Credits:

  • Produced and Reported by Leona Hamid
  • Assistant Producer: Madelyn Parr
  • Research by Zayana Youssef
  • Additional Production: Tom Wright and G. Stiles
  • Editing: Dave Anderson
  • Story Editing: Max O’Brien
  • Executive Producers: Max O’Brien, Craig Strachan, Catherine St. Louis, and Jonathan Hirsch
  • Sound Design and Score: Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson

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Note: This summary omits advertisements, non-content sections, and repetitions to focus solely on the episode's substantive narrative and discussions.

Transcript

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[Sam Anderson]

Listen to all episodes the Arsonist Next Door ad free right now by subscribing to the Binge. Visit the Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page or visit getthebinge.com to get access. Wherever you listen the Binge feed your true crime obsession.

[The Binge]

The Binge.

[Instacart Advertiser]

Novel.

[Ken Williams]

Yeah, getting that other lane. Yeah, the other. Oh no, I'm sorry. Give you the wrong direction.

[Sam Anderson]

This is Ken Williams. He was a local at the time of the arson spree and still lives in the area. He wasn't born in Phoenix. He moved here as a young man from the beautiful state of New Jersey. Same place I'm from.

[Ken Williams]

You want to hear something funny? When my kid brother first visited me out here and we're getting into the mountain preserves areas, he goes, what is this? He goes, is this the landfill? I call it landfill.

[Sam Anderson]

This is the little landfill.

[Ken Williams]

Oh my God. No, that's a real mountain kid.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken is an older man with a square jaw, bright blue eyes, and the demeanor of a kind uncle. He's directing me and my producer, Leona from the backseat of our cute red Mini Cooper, but she barely fits in. We're driving through the suburban sprawl of North Phoenix towards the striking mountain ranges that encircle the valley. We're on the way to the scene of a fire that changed the course of Ken's life.

[Ken Williams]

My brain's fried. Man, the heat's getting.

[Sam Anderson]

I said the same thing. Gazing up at those mountains as we drive, I'm struck by the immense beauty of this place. It's way greener than I thought it would be, and the preserves are teeming with life. Cactuses are everywhere. Short ones, tall ones, fat ones, skinny ones, long, dangly, ridiculous ones that look straight out of a Dr. Seuss book. @ night, coyotes and javelinas, which are like little wild piggies, will appear in your backyard, and you can hear a chorus of insects and owls hooting. But you'll also hear the constant hum of traffic rumbling down huge six lane roads. Phoenix is the fifth largest city in the U.S. these beautiful mountains we're driving past, they almost got transformed into urban sprawl back in the 70s. Local activists fought hard to protect the mountains from development. But where those environmentalists wrote petitions, made a float for the Phoenix Rodeo Parade, and even took lawmakers on horseback rides through the mountains. CSP is using arson, and the homes they're burning aren't even in the preserve. But driving past this peaceful oasis, I can start to understand why any development might feel threatening and why some people might be driven to take extreme action against it. My daydream is interrupted when Ken begins to tell me a story.

[Ken Williams]

I wanted to say it was closer to Christmas, you know, like maybe the 20th of December.

[Sam Anderson]

Somewhere around there in the year 2000. Ken is at home in his yard.

[Ken Williams]

I was just cooking up some chicken, some steaks on the grill for the family, and I see an orange glow reflecting off my backyard window. And I turn around, I go, oh, my God, a fire. I could see the flames shooting up into the sky. And so I called the wife. I said, hey, take over.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken hands over the barbecue tongs to his wife, because he knows immediately this fire must be part of the arson spree. That was 25 years ago. Now I want to see the place for myself. From the backseat of the car, Ken directs us to the scene of the fire.

[Ken Williams]

So I leave this gate here, and I've run up the street here.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken heads toward the glowing light in the distance. Keep going straight?

[Ken Williams]

Yeah, keep going straight.

[Sam Anderson]

So it was up here?

[Ken Williams]

Yeah, it's up over here by the red car.

[Sam Anderson]

We're driving into a cul de sac full of big houses. The location triggers a rush of memories from Ken.

[Ken Williams]

And as I'm running up this hill, I can see this thing's really igniting pretty fast.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken is getting closer and closer to the fire.

[Ken Williams]

And I could hear the sirens coming, and you could feel the heat as you were approaching it.

[Sam Anderson]

Are you running?

[Ken Williams]

Yeah, I'm running now. Other people from the neighborhood are starting to head this way.

[Sam Anderson]

There at the end of the cul de sac, is another large house under construction. The timber frame is engulfed in flames.

[Ken Williams]

I mean, it's going up like a Roman candle because this thing is burning, like, real fast.

[Sam Anderson]

Acrid black smoke fills the air.

[Ken Williams]

There's no way you were going to be able to salvage any part of that thing.

[Sam Anderson]

Around the same time Ken was running up the hill towards the flames, Lieutenant Rob Handy gets a phone call. CSP's seventh attack. Immediately, he thinks of his prime suspect, the anti development hermit. They've been watching him for weeks, lying in wait to catch him. If he sets off to start a fire, Rob calls the surveillance team.

[Rob Handy]

We actually had eyes on him and he was in his home.

[Sam Anderson]

Their main suspect is right there in his house, nowhere near the fire.

[Rob Handy]

That's another kick in the gut.

[Sam Anderson]

Rob's best lead has gone up in smoke. It was a low point for sure. But then a stroke of luck. One of the neighbors saw a suspicious man at the scene of the latest fire. He was watching calmly from the sidewalk as the house burned. A guy they hadn't seen around the neighborhood before. The man was white, middle aged with glasses, and the witness said he was acting kind of shady. A sketch artist is called in to create a detailed likeness of the suspicious character. Finally they have something solid to go on. Someone must know who this man is. There's no time to waste.

[Rob Handy]

We were scared. We were scared for the community. Or scared what was going to happen.

[Sam Anderson]

From Sony Music Entertainment and Novel I'm Sam Anderson. This is the arsonist next door. Episode 2 Smoke and Mirrors By December of 2000, everyone building houses near the preserve is well aware of the arson spree, including Danielle Sink.

[Danielle Sink]

We had takeout from this wonderful little place called Chino Bandito.

[Sam Anderson]

Chino Bandido.

[Danielle Sink]

Mm Chino Bandido. Tiki Audi.

[Sam Anderson]

Love it.

[Danielle Sink]

It's delicious. But we always remember just the meal we had the night the fire.

[Sam Anderson]

On the same evening that Ken Williams was working the barbecue, Danielle and her family were enjoying black beans and jade chicken from Chino Bandito. It's a local restaurant with a menu that's Chinese and Mexican and Jamaican too.

[Danielle Sink]

Is a little hodgepodge.

[Sam Anderson]

Danielle is tall with long, striking white hair. She speaks gently and distinctly. I find myself leaning forward slightly to listen when she talks. At the time of the fires, Danielle is a doctor at a local hospital teaching medical students and residents. She and her husband have three kids, two boys under 10 and a daughter just two months old. So the whole family is crowded around the dinner table. The baby is in a highchair.

[Danielle Sink]

We lived in a house that had gotten a little too small for our family, but we absolutely loved the neighborhood. So we bought some empty land a couple blocks away and spent a few years designing a house and saving up money to be able to build our dream house and then started building it in 1999.

[Sam Anderson]

By December, their new home is finally coming into focus. Danielle fantasizes about the views she's going to enjoy as she sips her coffee in the morning.

[Danielle Sink]

I can walk out my front door and I can get onto the mountain and have a view across all the city and imagine all the people's lives going on in the twinkling lights.

[Sam Anderson]

You see, for Danielle and her family, the house is more than just a place to live.

[Danielle Sink]

It was, I think, a symbol of success. I was successful in my job. My husband was successful in his. We were building this big house that was going to be something we were really proud of, and we were excited to raise our children in it.

[Sam Anderson]

But as the family chows down on the Chinese, Mexican, Jamaican take Audi, it's hard to ignore the elephant in the room.

[Danielle Sink]

The story about the fires was pretty much everywhere. Everyone at work was talking about it, and people would be saying, what happened. There was another fire. There was a lot of fear because these were big fires going up with huge amounts of flame. Houses nearby them were almost set on fire, and everyone and was really concerned that someone was going to be injured or killed.

[Sam Anderson]

For Danielle, as a doctor, the fear runs deep.

[Danielle Sink]

Burn injuries are just kind of a horrifying thing. And so people who have very serious burns spend years getting multiple surgeries to recover from. It's just foolish and dangerous and cruel to put somebody through that.

[Sam Anderson]

And it's not just the most horrific possibilities. There's also the more mundane concerns that are grinding people down.

[Danielle Sink]

Did we need extra insurance? Did we need to hire security? Did we need dogs to guard our properties?

[Sam Anderson]

The preserves mean a lot to Danielle, and she understands why people would want to protect them. But she has no sympathy for CSP's methods.

[Danielle Sink]

Protecting the environment is a very good thought, but going about it in a way that is damaging, it doesn't help the cause and it doesn't help the earth. I just thought they were being complete idiots.

[Sam Anderson]

Danielle and her husband installed a couple extra security measures and tried to put aside their fears. Up until now, they've continued to build with no sign of trouble. Danielle likes to take her kids to visit the new house and celebrate the progress. The boys even put up Christmas decorations in the fresh timber frame.

[Danielle Sink]

The kids wanted to make sure that Santa knew how to come to the new house in addition to the old house. They were worried that if we move, there might be a problem there.

[Sam Anderson]

As the family finishes off the last scraps of their chino banditos, they're feeling festive. It's Christmas, after all, and they're excited to move into their new home. And just at that moment, they notice a rhythmic thumping sound in the distance.

[Danielle Sink]

The boys are having fun, and we're Talking. And then suddenly my husband's like, there's helicopters. There were multiple helicopters that you could hear flying over.

[Sam Anderson]

Danielle pulls the baby out of the highchair and rushes toward the front door.

[Danielle Sink]

The entire sky over the mountain was blowing. It was nighttime and you could see helicopters and flashing lights from fire trucks.

[Sam Anderson]

The streets are suddenly filled with traffic.

[Danielle Sink]

There was a line of cars going all through the neighborhood.

[Sam Anderson]

Fire trucks are trying to get to the scene while a crowd of curious neighbors heads towards the glowing fire on the mountain. They want to see who's been hit. This time Danielle's husband already knows.

[Danielle Sink]

He looked at me and said, our house is burned down. The fire and the glow were so big that we knew that the house was gone. There's no way the firefighters could have saved it.

[Sam Anderson]

The new house is only a couple of blocks from the old one. Standing in the street, Danielle can see the flames getting higher and higher, fueled by the desert wind. She's worried for their neighbor Tom.

[Danielle Sink]

You can see the flames going towards Tom's house from the wind. And I was very fearful that his house was going to burn and if that burned, then the mountain would go up.

[Sam Anderson]

Over the next several hours, firefighters put out the blaze. Neighbor Tom's house lives to see another day. When the dawn comes, it's bright and clear. Just four days until Christmas. Danielle drives to the site of the fire to assess the damage. The scene is swarming with people. Law enforcement, fire investigators, journalists and neighbors are milling around.

[Danielle Sink]

The mountain looked pristine and my lot was just a burned out black apocalypse in the middle of this beautiful neighborhood.

[Sam Anderson]

The only thing that's still standing is an outdoor fireplace.

[Danielle Sink]

Everything else was charred and black and on the ground.

[Sam Anderson]

A police officer approaches Danielle and said.

[Danielle Sink]

Bam, is this yours? And he held out his hand and there was a little ceramic Santa Claus. He found it in the rubble, pulled it out of the rubble and gave it to me. Just the night before had been bright red with rosy cheeks and now he had baked in the fire back to just a plain white ceramic.

[Sam Anderson]

Danielle takes the tiny Santa and closes her fingers around it, thinking about how she's going to explain all this to her kids.

[Danielle Sink]

Santa survived. Santa's still going to come.

[Sam Anderson]

Was there anything else you recovered from the home?

[Danielle Sink]

There was nothing. There was nothing at all.

[Sam Anderson]

Lieutenant Rob Handy of the Phoenix Police Department has arrived at the scene of the fire. He's still reeling from the loss of his main suspect, the anti development hermit who was safely under surveillance last night as Danielle's house burned.

[Rob Handy]

The more this continued, somebody was going to get hurt and possibly killed. Firefighters were in danger. When firefighters go in to fight these fires, they have no idea if there's a basement.

[Sam Anderson]

Even on some of these homes, Basements are a firefighter's worst nightmare.

[Rob Handy]

If there is a basement, they could be on a floor that collapses during a fire.

[Sam Anderson]

If the floorboards collapse, they'll be trapped in the suffocating heat of a fiery pit with no escape. This kind of accident happens often enough that firefighters have a word for it. They call it a widowmaker. As the risk to human life continues to grow with each new fire, Rob is under serious pressure to solve this case. And frankly, he's overwhelmed.

[Rob Handy]

We really felt like we're losing control of this thing.

[Sam Anderson]

This latest fire at Danielle's place is once again outside the area that police have been surveilling.

[Rob Handy]

You know, I don't know. We were also in a bad spot at that point. You know, we couldn't get ahead of this thing. We needed more resources. I knew we needed more resources. We were trying.

[Sam Anderson]

Do my ears deceive me, or is the proudly independent lieutenant finally ready to ask for help? So far, Rob's been resistant to accepting assistance from the FBI. But now it's obvious even to rob that it's time to call in the cavalry. So when he gets a call from an FBI boss, Rob says, okay, come on down to the scene, let's talk.

[Rob Handy]

He came, we stood at the car, and we literally shook hands and agreed how we would work this thing over the trunk of a car in the middle of the night.

[Sam Anderson]

He now has the full might of the FBI behind him. What Rob once described as a neighborhood problem has officially blown up. And it won't be long before they're on the trail of some very juicy new leads.

[Ken Williams]

We gave them a good shake. I mean, we went through their knickers big time.

[Scott Meyer]

It's springtime, and so that means our family's outside more, playing in the yard, running errands. It also means we're away from the home more often. FBI data shows break ins are more likely during daylight hours than at night. It was time for us to up our protection game. We chose simplisafe. The outdoor basic package is also called the lighthouse system Was exactly what we needed. Smart cameras, motion sensors, entry detection for the perimeter of our home without any complicated installation. If someone's lurking outside, Simplisafe's professional monitoring team is on it fast. They can speak through the camera, activate spotlights, even alert the police before anyone gets near the door. No contracts, no hidden fees. Monitoring starts at around a dollar a day and there's a 60 day money back guarantee. Visit simplisafe.com crimes to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free. That's SimpliSafe.com crimes. There's no safe like SimpliSafe.

[Sam Anderson]

Want more true crime? Subscribe to the binge to get all episodes of the Arsonist Next Door ad free today and get instant access to over 50 other jaw dropping true crime stories. Plus subscribers get a binge drop of a brand new series on the first of every month. Search for the binge channel on Apple podcasts or head to getthebinge.com to subscribe today. Soon after Lieutenant Rob Handy accepts the help of the FBI, a huge joint task force is assembled.

[Rob Handy]

Within a couple weeks, we had swelled from 10 to 15 people working on it to about 40 or 50.

[Sam Anderson]

Among the dozens of agents told to join the task force is Ken Williams, the local man we met earlier who left his grill to run to the fire. Because Ken Williams is more than just a neighbor of Danielle Sink. He's also a special agent with the FBI, and now his bosses want him to investigate the case unfolding in his very own neighborhood.

[Ken Williams]

It's not a democracy, you know, you gotta do what the boss tells you to do.

[Sam Anderson]

At first, Ken is resistant to the idea of joining the arson task force because he already has his hands full with another case.

[Ken Williams]

I have a confidential human source who was a member of a terrorist organization.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken has a source who's a member of a terrorist group and he's paying this source for information.

[Ken Williams]

This guy was making a pretty substantial chunk of change a month because he would give us good information.

[Sam Anderson]

The source has just given Ken a new lead.

[Ken Williams]

He told me about these two individuals that were going to school at Embry Riddle University up in Prescott, Arizona.

[Sam Anderson]

Prescott is a town about two hours north of Phoenix.

[Ken Williams]

My informant told me that these two guys were very much active in recruiting young Muslim males around the world, recruiting.

[Sam Anderson]

Them into terrorist organizations.

[Ken Williams]

I remember the informant telling me specifically, he said, these guys are the real deal.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken trusts his source. His gut tells him to follow this lead and look into these two guys who may be recruiting young Muslim men to become terrorists. And that's why he's trying to avoid getting pulled onto the arson case. But it's not long before one of his bosses beckons him over with a certain look in his eye.

[Ken Williams]

He's standing by his door and he says, come on, I need to talk to You. He pulled me into his office.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken knows immediately where this is going.

[Ken Williams]

These fires were getting out of hand. We thought it was an eco terrorist group, and it was like all hands were called on deck to his boss.

[Sam Anderson]

Tells him, we need you on the Phoenix case. Though we did try. We weren't able to reach his former boss for an interview. Ken recognizes that the eco terror case is important, but pushes back. After all, he's an international terror expert and this is a domestic case.

[Ken Williams]

If I'm a heart surgeon, don't ask me to perform lung surgery. I communicated that to the bosses, but it wasn't the boss. I wasn't calling the shots.

[Sam Anderson]

His boss is unmoved. And while it might sound crazy to prioritize a local arson over possible Islamic terrorists, remember this is before the war on terror. In the Y2K era, lefty groups and eco terrorists are one of the FBI's top priorities. Ken is fighting a losing battle.

[Ken Williams]

I had to go do what I had to do. On the arson case.

[Sam Anderson]

He joins the FBI's arson team led by Special Agent Terry Kearns, who you met last episode. And for Rob Handy and Terry Kearns, this is their lucky day because Ken Williams really is one of the best, and they need backup.

[Rob Handy]

I didn't have the experience to do what I was doing, Quite honestly.

[Terry Kearns]

We needed help.

[Sam Anderson]

This is a bigger case than either of them have ever led before. They now have huge resources at their disposal. Heavily armed SWAT teams and a hostage rescue team have joined surveillance efforts in the preserves.

[Terry Kearns]

They would sit in the preserve overnight with night vision goggles and all that.

[Sam Anderson]

All this surveillance was costing them up to $40,000 a week. But even with all these resources, they still have no one to point their guns at. They don't have any strong leads. And apart from the notes left behind by csp, there's not much evidence either.

[Terry Kearns]

Our joke with the fire department was that they wash all the evidence away because what do you do? You put the wet stuff on the red stuff. Right?

[Sam Anderson]

The one thing they do have is that sketch of the suspect reported at the scene of the latest fire. It's a detailed depiction of a white, middle aged man with glasses. When Ken, a white, middle aged man with glasses, arrives at the task force hq, he sits down for the daily briefing. Copies of the sketch are passed around.

[Ken Williams]

When I saw the composite sketch, I said, you know, that's me. This witness is describing me. And it stands to reason because I was one of the first ones on the scene.

[Sam Anderson]

That's right. The sketch depicts not the arsonist but one of their own agents.

[Ken Williams]

I'll tell you, I don't know if it was one of our artists or one of the PD artists that did it, but it was a very good picture.

[Sam Anderson]

After having a good laugh or possibly a cry, the team decides to refocus on one of their last remaining sources of information.

[Terry Kearns]

We set up a 1-800-hotline so that people could call in if they had tips of anything that they thought might be helpful.

[Sam Anderson]

And the Phoenix community is all over that tip line.

[Terry Kearns]

We had a lot of phone calls with leads coming in. I think we had thousands.

[Rob Handy]

We got tips all the time, constantly.

[Terry Kearns]

Some of them you look at more seriously and some you can rule out right away.

[Rob Handy]

They left early in the morning one morning, and they were wearing dark clothing. And they must have done it because there was a fire that day.

[Terry Kearns]

We would rather somebody call something in and go run it out and it be nothing than to not be that call. And it was the one call that might give us the break that we needed.

[Sam Anderson]

Imagine the paranoia that must have been running through the community by this point. Reading through some of the leads that got called in through the tip line. So many of them were just complete shots in the dark. A park ranger called in to report some graffiti he found in the preserve. Someone spray painted, quote, civic legacy, andromeda success. It's not csb, but it does have a C. And there's also a square. And then there's a young guy spotted with a painting in the back of his car window. It says, you build it, we burn it. The same tagline used by the Earth Liberation Front and csp. They tail this kid to the coffee shop where he works, drag him out back, and give him the shakedown. He's a journalism student. He swears that he just thinks it's a cool phrase, nothing more. Sounds pretty suspicious, right? But it turns out he's telling the truth. He's just a kid with a subversive taste in art. And here's the thing. All of us do things that can look kind of suspicious in the right context.

[Terry Kearns]

In my career, just over 20 years, there was probably only one or two times I had a case where there wasn't a skeleton in the closet.

[Rob Handy]

I mean, if you go look in anybody's trash can on a consistent basis for a couple months, you're going to find weird stuff. It just teaches you people are strange.

[Terry Kearns]

You can't just go down one rabbit hole. You kind of have to try to look at as many possibilities as you can.

[Sam Anderson]

Veteran investigator Ken Williams has some advice for his young teammates. Start diving down a few of the most promising rabbit holes to see if any of the little bunnies who live there hate mansions and love fire. Rabbit hole number one.

[Ken Williams]

We got contacted about this particular female firefighter.

[Sam Anderson]

A firefighter suspected of arson.

[Ken Williams]

This could be it. When either a bunch of cops get together or a bunch of firefighters get together and they're going to point the finger at one of their own, you got to take that very seriously.

[Sam Anderson]

Everyone knows about the thin blue line. And I'm guessing that goes for the guys in the red suits too. The law enforcement crowd rarely rats each other out, even when they commit serious crimes. So when they do break ranks, it catches Ken's attention. And there's actually a well documented connection between firefighters and arson. Could this woman be part of csp? An ego radical working from inside the system?

[Ken Williams]

She's made comments about they shouldn't be building along the preserves, that type of stuff. She was off on a lot of the days that these fires took place. So it all started to build up.

[Sam Anderson]

Sounds promising. Her colleagues also have some less concrete evidence.

[Ken Williams]

She kind of had like a goofy reputation. Outdoor enthusiast, mountain biker. That gets you excited.

[Sam Anderson]

She was a mountain biker?

[Ken Williams]

Oh yeah.

[Sam Anderson]

But it's not just super vague personality profiling. Whoever is lighting these fires, they are always one step ahead. Maybe that does point to an inside job.

[Terry Kearns]

As soon as we'd have surveillance on a mile area, an arson would happen just outside of that surveillance area.

[Sam Anderson]

Agent Terry Kearns.

[Terry Kearns]

Again, we would expand the surveillance area and arson would happen just outside to the point where we really started wondering, is there a leak?

[Sam Anderson]

With all this in mind, Ken leaps into action and investigates the female firefighter. He brings her in for questioning.

[Ken Williams]

She gave us some alibi, stuff we told this is a very serious matter. If you're lying to us, we'll put you in jail.

[Sam Anderson]

But it turns out her alibis, they're solid. She was not at the scene of.

[Ken Williams]

The fires, so we ruled her out.

[Sam Anderson]

I do wonder whether the fact that she was a woman working in a pretty male dominated field might just have a little something to do with the huge amount of scrutiny she received from her colleagues. Ken is at home lying in bed next to his wife. Kids are asleep. When the phone rings.

[Ken Williams]

My wife was used to it. Yeah. Her dad was a cop, but she's now an ex wife, so maybe she didn't get used to it.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken stumbles out to the landline its headquarters. A tip has come in from a security guard who spotted a suspicious man inside a construction site on the edge of the preserve.

[Ken Williams]

He catches a guy, semi naked in this building under construction, masturbating.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken rushes down to the station.

[Ken Williams]

When you get something like that, you don't even care about sleeping. Sleep goes out the door, you know, you can go 48 hours without sleep, you know?

[Sam Anderson]

When he gets there, the officer on duty briefs him about this new suspect they just arrested at a construction site. He's a local man with a complicated past. Once accused of murder.

[Ken Williams]

It was his fiance, and it was a suspicious drug overdose. They thought maybe he had something to do with it, but they never proved anything there.

[Sam Anderson]

Could this local guy be setting fires for sexual gratification? Because believe it or not, that sort of thing is well documented. Some convicted arsonists have set fires because it turns them on.

[Ken Williams]

Obviously, as an investigator, when you see that a person was masturbating in a house that's under construction in the middle of the night, yeah, you take that really serious.

[Sam Anderson]

Rabbit hole number two. Ken starts digging into who this guy really is.

[Ken Williams]

We were going strong after him.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken grills the man on where he was during each of the fires. He gives Ken alibis for all of them. Then he throws himself on Ken's mercy. Yes, he masturbates in construction sites, but he's not an arsonist. He can explain.

[Ken Williams]

He gets sexually excited when he smells fresh cut wood, and he says it's an issue for him.

[Sam Anderson]

I like to think of myself as a pretty open minded guy, and I definitely don't want to kink shame anybody. But the smell of freshly cut wood, that's a new one for me. Ken isn't satisfied. He tracks down the man's friends and interviews his current wife. And according to her, apparently, this wasn't.

[Ken Williams]

The first time he's ever done anything like that.

[Sam Anderson]

Ken methodically checks out each of the man's alibis. And just like the firefighter, they're solid.

[Ken Williams]

He's still a problem, but he's not the arsonist.

[Sam Anderson]

I think about what this process must have been like for these two suspects to find themselves in the crosshairs of a major FBI investigation.

[Ken Williams]

We can make your life miserable. Nobody wants to be under the microscope of the FBI. Trust me, it is ruthless. I take that responsibility very seriously. So before I unleash the kraken on you, you know, I gotta be very certain that I really think that you're the bad person.

[Sam Anderson]

The guy jerking off in the construction site, he kind of had it coming. But the firefighter. The FBI might have ruled her out. But she still had to go to work the next day with the same colleagues who said she had a goofy reputation and therefore might be an arsonist. The firefighter and that local guy are just two of the many leads the team chases down. All of them end up in dead ends. Even with all of Ken's experience, the investigators are still struggling to find the needle in that haystack of tips. But they're not just relying on tips. Investigators take more proactive measures too. Rabbit hole number three. They target the small but mighty cohort of environmental activists in Phoenix. And not all of them appreciate the attention.

[The Binge]

Because we all know it's bullshit. Every one of us. We all know each other. Next thing you know, I get a knock on the door. I open the door and. And it's the FBI.

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[Sam Anderson]

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[Sam Anderson]

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[The Binge]

We don't give a about rich people of some rich person that got their house burned down. Who gives a? We didn't.

[Sam Anderson]

This is Scott Meyer. He's tall, a bit more put together than you'd expect from a lifetime activist, and he has a sort of permanently bemused expression on his face.

[The Binge]

There's a lot of piles of boxes.

[Sam Anderson]

All over the office in his house is full of anti capitalist memes printed out and stuck on the walls. Got some cool stuff here.

[The Binge]

Yeah, this cool stuff, quote unquote.

[Sam Anderson]

He's been an environmental activist in Phoenix for decades. His specialty is taking polluters to court. And he's really good at it.

[The Binge]

We've put over 95 people in federal court, won every one of them we just scared the hell out of everybody.

[Sam Anderson]

Scott lives with his longtime collaborator, Steve. They run a group called Don't Waste Arizona. And they're both frustrated at the narrative springing up in the news about environmentalists.

[The Binge]

Being eco terrorists, which is just pure bullshit.

[Sam Anderson]

Next thing he knows, Scott hears a knock at the door. He cracks it open and his dog goes crazy. In the hallway outside are two serious looking dudes.

[The Binge]

$3,000 suits, you know, and so one guy had a magenta suit. I was just like, wow, it's really nice suit, you know.

[Sam Anderson]

It'S the FBI. The agents introduce themselves and come inside. Scott drags his dog out of the room to protect that gorgeous suit from dog hair. Once they've settled down, the interrogation begins.

[The Binge]

They were like, your name came up, you know, concerning these fires and says, yeah, we heard about him. Will you ever go up there, you know, to that area? Well, no, why would we? We don't live up there.

[Sam Anderson]

Scott and Steve live in the south of Phoenix, which is completely on the other side of town from where the fires are taking place. One FBI agent's attention is drawn to the wall of Scott's house. There's a big map of Phoenix covered with colored pins, like something straight out of a true crime show.

[The Binge]

They were studying that and looking at that and they just didn't know what to think.

[Sam Anderson]

You know, Scott told me the map actually shows the location of pollution sites for lawsuits they're working on. There's the copper smelter releasing toxic emissions into the air. A toxic waste incinerator that they're trying to stop from being built. There's low income communities affected by a poisonous chemical fire which is being completely ignored by the epa. Honestly. Shout out to Scott Meyer and don't waste Arizona. I was really impressed with their work, but most of it focused on polluters. Developers building on the preserve in the wealthy Phoenix suburbs couldn't be lower on Scott's list of concerns. We didn't care.

[The Binge]

We didn't give a shit. We deal like mining towns, you know, where people got cancer and they're poisoned and the EPA and the state government isn't doing anything to help them. Five year old kids are running around with tumors in their head. These are the kinds of things that concerned us. These were our issues.

[Sam Anderson]

Scott explains all of this to the magenta suit and his colleague.

[The Binge]

I kept asking him, who gave you our name? You know, why are you here? What makes you think that we would have anything to do with this? And besides, you know, it's not like the FBI isn't aware of us.

[Sam Anderson]

This, I should mention, is not Scott's first rodeo with the FBI.

[The Binge]

If you're an environmentalist or a peace activist, you're on surveillance almost from immediate start.

[Sam Anderson]

Scott isn't surprised the FBI is at his door. He's surprised the FBI doesn't already know he's not the arsonist from all the phone tapping and surveillance he says they're doing on him.

[The Binge]

And whenever they would decide to listen in, it would click. It had this audible click. And you pick up the receiver, and of course, there's no dial tone. I had fun with it. I banged some pots and pans by the receiver. I'd pick it up and say some really crass things about their mother. And about 15 seconds later, they'd hang up.

[Sam Anderson]

The agents question them for about half an hour and get nowhere.

[The Binge]

We don't know anything.

[Sam Anderson]

But what about csp, the Coalition to Save the Preserves?

[The Binge]

That's not a real crew. That's not any of us. We knew them all at that time. I mean, we were in the center of it all. And it's a very small group of people.

[Sam Anderson]

Scott says no one in his circle has heard of this new radical group, the Coalition to Save the Preserves.

[The Binge]

It was like, who is this group? We never heard of that. So it was real obvious to me that this was just a ploy.

[Sam Anderson]

Scott's theory is that it's not a group of people. It's just one guy. Taking advantage of the FBI and the media obsession with eco terrorism, he sends the agents packing with some free advice.

[The Binge]

We told him, what you're looking for is somebody in the neighborhood who is upset about these new homes are coming up and ruining his view. You're looking for a local.

[Sam Anderson]

As the New Year approaches, 2001, the pressure to catch CSP is starting to take its toll on the investigators and their families.

[Ken Williams]

My wife and kids were concerned about this. Who are these people? Where are they coming from? It's got to be one of our community members. I mean, you know, they know the neighborhood. It was terrorizing the community. There's no question about.

[Sam Anderson]

Seems like nowhere is safe. Ken goes to church one Sunday and is distracted from the sermon. He glances suspiciously at his fellow worshipers.

[Ken Williams]

This person to the right of me or the left of me or behind me, in front of me. I'm sure every other member of the community was having those type of thoughts, too. You see somebody filling up their gas can. Where are they going with this bucket of gasoline? You know, how do I know they're going to be putting it in their lawnmower.

[Sam Anderson]

Special Agent Terry Kearns is feeling the squeeze too.

[Terry Kearns]

I had been out to dinner with some friends and was driving home. It was dark and the windows were up because it was cold and I think it must have just come in through the vents. And I smelled that smell of something burning and I freaked out immediately.

[Sam Anderson]

Terry gets her boss on speakerphone and.

[Terry Kearns]

I'm like, there's another arson. Where is this at? You know, why haven't we got a call? I think he thought I lost it. He's like, calm down. We haven't got any calls. Just that smell triggered those arson sites. You really put your life into cases like this.

[Sam Anderson]

And while the investigators flounder, the media spotlight is getting brighter and brighter with.

[Rob Handy]

Each public note or every news story. It was almost like a kick in the gut.

[Sam Anderson]

And then just at that moment of maximum stress, the investigative team is dealt another blow. The vibe we got was that law enforcement was very upset. Next time on the Arsonist next door, a 28 year old journalist gets a mind blowing scoop. Meeting the arsonists right under their noses was probably pretty embarrassing. Don't want to wait for that next episode. You don't have to unlock all episodes of the Arsonist Next Door ad free right now by subscribing to the Binge Podcast channel. Search for the binge on Apple Podcasts and hit subscribe at the top of the page. Not on apple. Head to getthebinge.com to get access wherever you listen. As a subscriber, you'll get binge access to new stories on the 1st of every month. Check out the Binge channel page on apple podcasts or getthebinge.com to learn more. The Arsonist Next Door is an original production of Sony Music Entertainment and Novel. This series was written and reported by me, Sam Anderson. It was produced and reported by Leona Hamid. Our assistant producer is Madelyn Parr. Research by Zayana Youssef. Additional production from Tom Wright and G. Stiles. Our editor is Dave Anderson. Additional story editing from Max o' Brien. From Novel. Our executive producers are Max o' Brien and Craig Strachan. From Sony Music Entertainment. Our executive producers are Catherine St. Louis and Jonathan Hirsch. Sound design, mixing and scoring by Nicholas Alexander and Daniel Kempson. Our original theme song was composed and performed by Nicholas Alexander. Production management from Sheree Huston, Joe Savage, Sarah Tobin and Charlotte Wolf. Fact checking by Danya Soleiman. Story development by Nell Gray Andrews. Novel's director of development is Selena Mehta and Willard Foxton is novel's creative director of development. Special thanks to Jen Fifield, Libby Gough, Bob Khan, Xander Adams, Anthony Wallace, Steve Ackerman, Carolyn Shurlevin and the team at reviewed and cleared Mario Caciotolo, Isaac Fisher, Kevin Lee Karas, Jess Swinburne, Sonny Marr, Karlie Frankel and the team at WME.

[Danielle Sink]

SA.