Reading police arrested a 32-year-old man after he admitted he was part of a group that set two cars ablaze in the Riverloft Apartments parking lot in December.<\/p>\n
Josue Negron-Lebron, 32, no permanent address, faces charges of arson, risking a catastrophe and criminal mischief in the Dec. 3 incidents in the 500 block of Pearl Street.<\/p>\n
He was committed to Berks County Jail in lieu of $110,000 bail following arraignment Tuesday night before District Judge Brian K. Strand in Reading Central Court.<\/p>\n
In requesting a high bail amount at the arraignment, Criminal Investigator Bradley Silcox cited an ongoing investigation of a second arson and concern that Negron-Lebron could flee to Puerto Rico, where he has relatives, when he heals from injuries suffered in a recent shooting.<\/p>\n
Details about the other fire and how Negron-Lebron was shot were unavailable.<\/p>\n
At the time of his arrest, Negron was wanted on a burglary charge from city police. Court records indicate that crime occurred Jan. 27.<\/p>\n
Additionally, Caernarvon Township police charged him by summons on Jan. 16 with retail theft, criminal mischief and open lewdness.<\/p>\n
Details of those cases were unavailable.<\/p>\n
Investigators provided this account in the probable cause for the arson case:<\/p>\n
Just after midnight on Dec. 3, Reading police and firefighters were dispatched to the Riverloft apartments at 550 Pearl St. for a vehicle fire. Members of the fire department extinguished the flames, which consumed two unoccupied vehicles, before police officers arrived.<\/p>\n
Firefighters said they smelled a strong odor of gasoline from both vehicles and requested the city fire marshal\u2019s office investigate the cause and origin of the fire.<\/p>\n
Fire investigators sent three pieces of fire debris to a state police crime lab for examination. The lab later reported that two of the items contained gasoline.<\/p>\n
The fire marshal\u2019s office determined the fire was set.<\/p>\n
Video footage from the apartments showed two suspects approaching the vehicles from Pearl Street. One is seen carrying a gallon-sized plastic jug.<\/p>\n
While they are near the vehicle, a flash occurs. Both suspects run from the vehicles, which are on fire, to an alley between Pearl and South Sixth streets, and disappear from the view of the camera.<\/p>\n
During the investigation, police learned Negon-Lebron had purchased gasoline, using a gallon container, at a nearby gas station.<\/p>\n
Video footage confirmed Negon-Lebron drove his pickup truck to the station and entered the store about 25 minutes before the fire.<\/p>\n
Silcox interviewed Negron-Lebron on Tuesday in City Hall.<\/p>\n
After being shown a still image from the gas station video, Negron-Lebron admitted he was part of the group that went to the Riverloft apartments and set a car on fire.<\/p>\n
He said gas was poured on the car, and he used a butane lighter to ignite it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Reading police arrested a 32-year-old man after he admitted he was part of a group that set two…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":105137,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[349,202,182,139,28,736,128,130,129,706],"class_list":["post-105136","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-berks-county","tag-crime-and-public-safety","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-pennsylvania","tag-reading","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news","tag-top-stories-reg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=105136"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/105136\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/105137"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=105136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=105136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=105136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}