Deputy Huskie has just been called to the scene of a structure fire in the middle of July. When he arrives, a small crowd of people has gathered at the scene. There is a woman with blond hair sitting on the ground, claiming that this was her home and she had been sleeping when she woke up to the flames. She was crying, claiming that her cat was still inside. There were two teenagers leaning against a tree and smoking cigarettes, watching from the front yard, along with an older man who was intrigued by the flames. The teenagers were a couple of punks who lived nearby and the older man was known as the neighborhood creeper and was a little “off.” He was known to knock on the woman’s door to talk with her, but she usually ignored him. There was another man with them who had short, brown hair and a huge, pink blister on his left hand. He coincidentally used to work for the woman, but had been fired the week before because he spent too much time texting. As firefighters worked to put out the blaze, one of them came out carrying a cat who had been hiding under a chair in the living room. The woman stopped crying and hugged her scared, little friend. Once the blaze was out, Deputy Huskie made notes of the house and found the worst damage in the bedroom. Almost everything in the room was black except for a round spot on the floor in front of an open window. Who opens the window in July? The ceiling had collapsed in the corner near the window as well, and Deputy Huskie noted that it was due to the window being open. He questioned the 4 people outside, but none of them claimed to have had anything to do with the fire. He decided that they were all telling the truth so he let them go and deemed the fire as accidental.

a. Was the fire arson or accidental? How do you know?
b. Who started the fire and what was the motive?
c. Was there any significance to the round spot on the floor that hadn’t burnt to a crisp? Explain.
d. If an accelerant had been used to start this fire, how and what should the fire investigator collect as evidence at the origin of a fire?