Man charged in Horry Wildfire pleads guilty, claims no responsibility for wildfire
-
Mark Torchi in court Wednesday morning. WBTW News13
-
Mark Torchi before a judge Wednesday morning. WBTW News13
Alternative content
Man charged in Horry Wildfire pleads guilty, claims...
The Conway man accused of starting a fire near his home that eventually led to one of the largest wildfires in South Carolina history pleaded guilty today, but did not take responsibility for the...
News 13
Torchi told reporters he called Horry County firefighters to put out the fire that he started, and they said it was extinguished
Published: October 28, 2009
Updated: October 28, 2009
MYRTLE BEACH, SC- The Conway man accused of starting a fire near his home that eventually led to one of the largest wildfires in South Carolina history pleaded guilty today, but did not take responsibility for the wildfire.
A jury trial was scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday morning for Mark Torchi.
He walked in at the Myrtle Beach Magistrate’s Court accused of starting the state’s second largest wildfire back in April in Horry County.
Torchi told the judge that he admits starting a fire in his backyard that go out of control on April 18th but he called firefighters to come and put it out. He added that he thought that was the end of it.
“I just want to point out to the court that my client takes no responsibility what so ever in the fire that occurred later on in the week,” said Torchi’s attorney Paul Taylor.
Members of the South Carolina Forestry Commission said they have reasons to believe the destructive fire was linked to Torchi’s backyard burn.
“Our investigation based on all the evidence we saw all the statements from the witnesses the burn pattern indicators out in the field point us to the origin area in his backyard as the same origin area where the fire from April 22nd came from,” said Forest Protection Chief Darryl Jones.
Some close by neighbors also showed up with Torchi inside the courtroom.
“Pretty much the whole neighborhood does it,” Torchi’s neighbor Connie Raymo, “and I know him very well he’s a great friend of ours and has been for a very long time and he would never do anything intentionally and the slander he had to take his family the ridicule was unheard of.“
The judge ordered Torchi to pay a fine of $732 for not notifying the SC Forestry Commission and for letting a fire spread. He was ordered to pay the fine by Nov.16th or serve 30 days in jail.
Forestry Commissioners ticketed Torchi for starting a fire near his Conway home. They say the fire he made rekindled and started the big Horry County wildfire in April.
The fire burned nearly 20,000 acres and destroyed 76 homes.
Torchi told reporters he called Horry County firefighters to put out the fire that he started, and they said it was extinguished.
Torchi requested a jury trial after being ticketed. It was originally scheduled to begin Thursday, Oct. 22, but was delayed.
Reader Reactions
As a matter of fact, i was a “good trooper”, but not in the setting you describe. While you [GS-13, alleged], had your snout in the public trough for 25 years, most of the working class had a real job, Most working 50 years or more nose to the grindstone to support the likes of you. Many work till they fall paying the taxes it takes to feather your nest. There is nothing lazier on earth than a professional overpaid under achiever who works for the gang in DC. [so called civil servants.] GS-13 step 4 = BSMOSPHD.
Ah, just as I suspected your reply might be…semantic based reply. Changing the subject back towards me and therefore off of the topic. As stated the facts do not concur with FS Investigators or the HCFD report regarding when they put the man’s fire out at his home. After a few days had elapsed, we are supposed to be mis-led into believing that a “lone ember” flew all the way to the supposed origin of the wilderness fire then, again after resting there for a few days sparked up all of a sudden. The only way I might believe that lie is if it could be proven that scarecrow457 was in the area talking that day and perhaps the hot air he is blowing fanned that lone ember. Seriously though, there are holes in the Forest Service/HCFD and other agency’s so called investigation(s) into this fire. Its already been aired on WBTW/WPDE/WIS that “officials” attempted (or at it appears that way) to have tried to cover up the fire’s wayward travels until the dash cam video all of a sudden came out. Then officials had to do some quick two stepping to cover their “story”. Now, for fear of being proven incorrect once again they just say nothing. As for prevailing wind knowledge, its readily available on the National Weather Service’s website, Weather underground, Navy weather flight planning website, NOAA, and several other sites that can tell you what the winds were on the day of the fire. But, the day of the fire isn’t when the man’s fire was so thats irrelevant. But your attempt to spin the facts only allows us to see that your on the side of those who feed you information under the pretense of “official-ness” and like a good trooper you accept it. My experience? I’m retired. I worked for 25 years in law enforcement in civil service and retired as a criminal investigator GS-13 step 4.
I stand by my post regarding the point of origin . I have to wonder where you get your facts. The Forest Service team doing the analysis has forgotten more about wildfires than you will ever know. I have had an opportunity to do a little myself, on one man fires fought by ME with a Cat D4 crawler and fire plow. Or on a few campaign fires fought by an army of rangers. It does not take a rocket scientist to determine point of origin, but a knowledge of prevailing wind and first hand experience in that line. Neither me or my team were ever successfully disputed in court regarding point of origin. Your experience IS ? [usscone]
scarecrow457 - The problem with your theory is that there was no “trail” leading from this man’s property to the point of origin as determined by the F.S. Another problem is that if that fire did originate at this man’s home (where HCFD put his fire out at according to their Incident Report) then there would have obviously been a vast number of homes along with timber areas burned in his area…There was not any! Another problem that your apparently either overlooking or do not know about is that the fire that the man had burning at his home (the one that HCFD had already extinguished) occurred several days BEFORE the fire that burned several hundred acres! No ember in arson investigation history has ever floated away covering several miles then, landed in another area then started to smolder and finally started a major forest fire. Another problem I have is that if anyone is content to just “rely on” what “officials” tell them then they are obviously naive’ & gullible and probably believe that JFK was assassinated by one bullet…and that bullet was found in pristine condition on his gurney at the hospital. I just hope that this man has an attorney who is worth his salt and can help this man get through the attempted cover up that “officials” are attempting to place upon him!
usscone, I agree completely. If they didn’t put out his fire, then they can’t blame that on him. And I’ll bet they did, and are doing exactly what you are saying. Remember, they did a lot of covering up with the records when it jumped into Barefoot, too.
I think many of you are missing the jest of this story. The man burned some trash in his backyard, as we ALL do and then, LATER on in the week the law enforcement arm of the Forest Service is trying to say that it also started the wildfire. I call BS here. This is more likely the scenario: Forest officials/law enforcement see a chance to link this wildfire and avoid having to deal with civil suits or other legalities to this man. Even though the man called HCFD and at that time, the HCFD PUT OUT that fire in than man’s backyard. A few days pass then the wildfire which actually started well away from this man’s house (or his neighborhood would been burned also)It needs to be noted that for days after the HCFD put out this man’s trash pile, NO FIRE was burning at all in the county. For some reason(s) people are wanting to hang this fire on this man and its wrong and needs to be stopped right now before it goes any further.
Ok Nighshift, will try to justify my comment. I am of the opinion that this case and 99% of others should go to the jury for disposition. Plea bargaining is the scourge of Justice in this country. Until it is eliminated in criminal proceedings there will be no true Justice. Try an accused for what he is charged with, not what he agrees to. Now to the fire. I think the State Forest Service investigation team is qualified to correctly determine point of origin of a wildfire. It is not that difficult. We must rely on the law [statute] to define who violated what. It [law] says basically the one who lights the match in the beginning is the culprit. It certainly is not the fire suppression teams fault in any event. Play the blame game all year, but it will change nothing. The man who started the fire was in court and admitted the fact.
I agree with Nightshift. If he called the fire department and they came, from that point on it was THEIR responsibility. Anyone would feel that way.
Now I have never thought people should be allowed to start fires, whether in the country or in the city. But in the south they are…and do. If he was supposed to get permission to do it, and failed to do that, then he should have to pay the fine. But blaming him for the wildfire and the stuff at Barefoot is beyond ridiculous.
Come on Scarecrow, what are you pretending not to know or just maybe you are not pretending?
Ok once again I feel as if I have to go on an on in order to explain reality to some of the little old men and women that seem to have a hard time keeping up. So here it is and I will try not to make it to long as I know some of you have trouble staying awake or may have to take a nap in between points of fact.
I believe that he said yes I am guilty of not first contacting the officials and telling them that he was going to be burning trash. He was burning the trash and it was getting out of control which he could very well have contained on his own, but being some what responsible he did the proper thing in not taking any chances, by calling the fire department. He and many other believe that once the task of due diligence had been passed from the home owner to the fire department that claimed to have put the fire out it then became their responsibility. It is just another example of if you live in this area and you want the job done right then you had better do the job yourself. Sad but true. I can not tell you how many times I have tried to let others do a job for me only to find that they seem to have little to no concept of what is and is not the proper way to do things. It is too bad for Mr. Torchi that he choose to call the fire department, rather than simply doing the job him self.
Let’s not forget that after the fire department failed at their job, he then called them back again, where based on results, they once again failed to protect the community. And yet for some reason people like you still want to blame this poor home owner that did the best he could short of not calling and putting the fire out himself.
It does dawn on me that this is not actually your opinion but rather the point of view that certain greedy lawyers want certain people to hold as truth.
I think once he called the fire department out to his house if it restarted then that is totally the fire departments fault.He shouldn’t admit fault if he tried to do the right thing by calling the fire department even if it was a little late….
Advertisement