Up in Flames: My Neighbor Tried to Kill My Family

On December 15, 2005, I made one of the biggest moves I ever made: I bought a house. I never imagined being able to buy a house and pay for it in full at such a young age. I tried to follow all of the tips and tricks and advice you get as a first time home buyer, but I am not sure who could have predicted what was ahead.

For a month before we moved in, my husband and I painted the house, got it carpeted and fixed what needed to be fixed. In all the time we were there, the neighborhood never changed.

On January 25, 2006, we moved our family in to our first home. Walking around MY home felt good. I didn't think we would reach our goal so soon but we did.

Weeks later, I began hearing my neighbor to the right of my house scream. I live in a row home and the walls are thin. If you don't live on the east coast or don't know what a row home is, row homes are homes that are all connected in a "row" on a block. A lot row homes in the Philadelphia area are older.

My neighbor would scream various things while inside the house and while outside of the house at various times. I never paid much attention to her because I figured she had some mental health issues.

It wasn't until April of 2006 that her screaming became a problem. My neighbor would do a lot of screaming at night and my kids would get scared. At one point, she started screaming at the neighborhood kids outside. She chased one boy to his home and started screaming obscenities at him and his family. She was calling someone from her cell phone, talking about the situation.

She used obscenities towards one of my children and started talking to me in a rude manner asking me if I had a problem and mumbling things under her breath. One day, she called me ugly and said something about "el Diablo". I started responding to her remarks by asking her if she had a problem with my son when L, the woman who lived with her walked up and asked me what was going on. I explained to her that M was being rude to me. L told me to ignore M because M was "crazy". I knew she had mental health issues, but knew what she was doing was wrong. The situation was getting to the point where she was going to hurt someone or I was going to hurt her. The shouting and yelling increased.

On May 20, 2006, I went to bed as normal. It was a Saturday and my husband and I had a small drink, but didn't drink too much. It was a good thing I didn't. I went to sleep at about 9:30 pm which was fairly early.

About 3:45 am, I heard M in her home breaking glass. I could hear her hitting items and then they would shatter. The shattering stopped for awhile. Then I heard fire trucks. As early as it was in the morning, they weren't hard to hear. As they got closer I got worried. When one row home is on fire, it puts the rest of the row homes at risk.
Soon the fire trucks were on my block, in front of my house. I could see the sirens spinning. I looked out the window to see where the fire was and I saw smoke coming from the right. I started smelling smoke. I woke my husband up in a panic and told home we had to get the kids and leave immediately because there was a fire. I told him to grab something to keep the kids warm. I grabbed the baby and a blanket and woke up my other two sons. They asked if they could put on pants and a shirt and I frantically yelled "NO!" and told them to come on and leave because there was a fire and we had to get out. While we walked through the front room to the front door, I grabbed our heavy blanket we use for lounging on the couch and I let then wrap themselves it in. We walked across the street to L and asked her what happened. She said "Oh my gosh, I am glad you got out! I was banging on your door so you and your family could get out." I asked L what happened. "How did the house catch fire?" I asked. "M set it on fire. She went from room to room lighting the curtains so we could all burn." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Someone purposely set their house on fire. I wasn't sure whether to believe L at first or not because it just didn't sound right.

Soon, there was a burst of smoke coming through the window and door of M's house. The firefighters were fighting the fire so we needed to move. L went to one side of the block and my family went to another. Because I was just in my robe and nothing else, a neighbor offered me a blanker and another let my family come into her home until we could return to our home.

Thank goodness the only damage was smoke damage to my interior and a bit of fire damage to my siding. After the fire was out, I went to talk to the Philadelphia Police Officer that had M in custody. I tried telling them what I heard and what experiences I had with M but they did not want to hear it. They did tell me that the fire marshal would investigate the fire.

Turns out M set 5 fires total: one in the bathroom which was the first one set, one in her bedroom, one in the hallway, one in the kitchen, and one in the living room which was the last one set. After she set them, she sat down in the living room. L and her husband came out of their room after they started smelling smoke. L's husband attempted to put out the bathroom fire and sustained second degree burns. L called the fire department so they could put out the fire. If L and her husband hadn't been home, we all could have burned to death. I am thankful to have my life and I am thankful that nothing more than minor damage to my home happened.

It has only been a day since this happened and I still can't believe it happened. I couldn't sleep last night. My kids were afraid to sleep last night. M is behind bars, but even so, the treat of dying by fire still exists and will forever haunt me.