Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Unhappy Ending

After being in the news business more than thirty years, there isn't much I haven't seen before.  Monday was a new one.

Police say a man from Pocono Summit, upset over the break up of a marriage and losing his home, decided to make some drastic changes.  First, he destroyed his home by soaking it in some sort of accelerant and setting it on fire.  There was an explosion.  The home was a ball of flames.  Windows and doors were blown out onto the front lawn, and the home was knocked off its foundation.  At least the guy did it at 3 AM.  I shudder to think what could have happened if it blew up during the day, with people walking through the neighborhood.

The man then got in his mini van, drove a few miles away, set it on fire, and took his own life.

It seems like a Hollywood movie involving some anti hero.  He didn't want a bank to get his house.  Now, it gets a pile of burned out and charred rubble.

As far as taking his own life, a Pocono Mountain Regional Police detective got it right.  All the man succeeded in doing is making the people who cared about him feel terrible.  The detective told me he's seen it happen too many times before.

It was a fascinating story.  Neighbors told me they never saw it coming.  They knew he was alone and had some problems.  They didn't know he'd take it this far.

You can see it a little bit in the photo I "borrowed" from WNEP photographer Dave Scarnato's Twitter page.  The home next door has melted siding and it nearly caught fire.  Strangely enough, the people who lived next door often invited their neighbor to social events because they knew he was single-- and he nearly destroyed their home.

I wish there was a moral to the story, a way to wrap up today's blog entry nicely and neatly.  There isn't.  It's just a sad, sad story, and we'll leave it at that.