The Arsonist’s Pen Pal

A while back I was able to break the news that Thomas Sweatt’s work as a serial arsonist started way before the series of Washington area fires from 2003-2005 that made him infamous. Investigators told me there were hundreds of previous fires. They just couldn’t publicly provide the specifics because of restrictions from the plea agreement with Sweatt.

All I knew is that the list of fires went back to the 1980s and that there had been at least one other death.

Now writer David Jamieson has the details on some of the fires and a lot more about the mind of Thomas Sweatt in this week’s Washington City Paper. Jamieson’s details are coming, not from investigators, but from the arsonist himself. Sweatt and Jamieson had been exchanging letters for the last year and a half.

It turns out the investigators closed out 353 cases with Sweatt’s help.

Among the fires Sweatt talks about is a 1985 D.C. blaze that killed a woman and her husband and burned their children. That fire wasn’t even classified as arson when it occurred.

This article also answers a question that I have wondered about since I began reporting on the arson spree. What was Thomas Sweatt’s connection to the area around Birchwood City in Prince George’s County?

Along with the neighborhoods around South Dakota Avenue and Bladensburg Road, NE, just up the street from the KFC where Sweatt worked, this Oxon Hill community was the hardest hit during the series of fires that initially caught the attention of fire investigators. I had done a number of stories about the fires in Birchwood City. Now, thanks to a letter Sweatt sent to David Jamieson I have an answer:

My sister in Ohio sent pictures of her house (I never seen) and her yard is beautiful. She has real grass that looks like carpet and flowers are really pretty. Her neighborhood reminded me of the Birtchwood Community off Livingston Rd in Oxxon Hill Md. My mind started to think of evil thing to do in that neighborhood. That’s so sad.

If you want to know more about someone who was among “the most prolific and dangerous arsonists in American memory”, this is well worth reading. If you are a fire investigator you don’t want to miss it.