BIG PINE KEY, Fla. (AP) - Authorities say a homeless man has been arrested for starting a fire in a shopping cart that grew into a brush fire in the Florida Keys.
In a statement Saturday morning, Monroe County Sheriff’s Office spokesman Adam Linhardt said 49-year-old Wynn Edgar Messenger was charged with malicious land burning and failure to control or report a dangerous fire.
Linhardt said the fire Friday night prompted evacuations on Big Pine Key before the flames were extinguished. He said Messenger admitted starting the fire in a shopping cart in the woods where he lives.
Messenger was held on $10,000 bond. Jail records didn’t show whether he had an attorney.
A separate brush fire burned on the same island for over a week in late April. That blaze destroyed two structures in areas still recovering from Hurricane Irma.
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