Police: Borough man caught on camera torching home
KAYLEE LINDENMUTH / SHENANDOAH SENTINEL - Smoke billows from a home at 322 West Penn Street on Jan. 18, 2020.
SHENANDOAH – A west end man is accused of setting his home aflame for insurance money, and officers say he was caught on camera in the act.
Felix Fermin Bermejo, 28, of 322 West Penn Street, is facing felony arson, risking a catastrophe, and insurance fraud charges in relation to the Jan. 18 fire.
Shenandoah and Mahanoy City firefighters were called to the home shortly after 8:30pm that day for the house fire. Arriving firefighters found smoke showing from the home, and fire venting from a basement window.
According to court documents:
Lt. William Moyer responded to the scene and spotted several cameras on the front and back porches, and found the main hub on a living room shelf. He removed the hub to preserve it.
The next morning, around 10:00am, State Police Fire Marshal John Burns, Trooper Joseph Hall, Shenandoah Fire Marshal Rick Examitas, and Moyer returned to the home to find a cause.
Burns determined the cause as an incendiary fire, starting on a couch in the basement.
Moyer and Examitas interviewed Bermejo around 8:00pm that night, Jan. 19 at the Shenandoah Police Station, and were told he had just taken out a $50,000 insurance policy on the home on Jan. 4.
He told police that he hadn’t stayed at the home for about four or five days, and said he was at the home twice on the 18th — once in the morning, and again in the afternoon, after a doctor’s appointment in Danville. He said he was staying with his fiance’s mother in Fountain Springs, and they stopped by the home to grab a snack and hot dogs for his son.
Bermejo said he went in the home alone, and was only there for about 20 minutes.
Police asked when he’d been in the basement last, which he said was Sunday, Jan. 17.
Asked how he found out about the fire, he said that, after he’d stopped at the home, he and his fiance went to Redner’s for groceries and gas, and were called by his fiance’s uncle as they were headed to Fountain Springs.
Bermejo provided a written consent form authorizing a search of his camera system, police said.
Moyer said that he’d seen Bermejo’s red pickup headed north on North Main Street around 7:47pm, and security cameras at the Rescue Hook and Ladder Fire Co. at Main and Coal caught the same a minute later.
The same cameras, as well as cameras at the Shenandoah Community Ambulance building at Main and Washington saw Bermejo’s truck travel north on Main, then west on Washington around 8:47pm, then, two minutes later, the truck reemerged downtown via West Lloyd Street, headed the same way as before.
Bermejo’s camera system was sent to an FBI lab for recovery of video.
Recovered videos showed Bermejo and his fiance at the home at 3:38pm, removing items and a dog until 5:01pm.
Around 8:24pm, they returned, and both entered the home, while his fiance left around 8:31pm. Bermejo was seen in the front doorway as his fiance left, and stayed behind, shutting the front door.
At 8:32pm, cameras showed the basement door opening, revealing Bermejo and visible flame. Moyer said he added something to the flame and then left, shutting the door behind him before ripping the camera down.
He did not exit the property via Penn Street.
Police once again interviewed Bermejo yesterday, Feb. 24, at the State Police barracks outside Frackville. Asked what he thought would’ve caused the fire, Bermejo said the insurance investigator had thought it was a wire to the back electrical baseboard heater.
Bermejo was charged with two counts of felony arson, one count of felony causing or risking a catastrophe, one count of felony insurance fraud, and one count of misdemeanor reckless endangerment.
Bermejo was arraigned yesterday by Magisterial District Judge Anthony Kilker and committed to Schuylkill County Prison, unable to post $50,000 bail.
About Author
