New video of toilet paper being set on fire being reviewed as part of Ontario arson investigation
ONTARIO, Calif. (KABC) — Investigators are examining a video posted to social media as part of their investigation into a massive warehouse fire that broke out early Tuesday morning in Ontario.
Arson investigators say the video appears to show cases of toilet paper being set on fire inside a warehouse while a person repeatedly says he is not paid enough to live on.
“If you’re not going to pay us enough to (expletive) live or afford to live, at least pay us enough not to do this,” the person in the video says.
Police have arrested 29-year-old Chamel Abdul-Karim on suspicion of felony arson. Authorities say he was working at the Kimberly-Clark Distribution Center through a third-party company at the time. Investigators say they are reviewing the video but have not confirmed whether the person shown in the footage is Abdul-Karim.
A co-worker of the suspect told reporters he had just met Abdul-Karim moments before the fire broke out and said there was initially no suspicion that he was involved.
“There was no suspicion that it was him, actually he was missing. So everyone was trying to find him. Everyone was blaming the robots at first. We were almost 100% sure it was the robots until the action in the video of course,” said Alex Montero of San Bernardino.
The fire, which erupted shortly after 12:30 a.m. Tuesday near Hellman and Merrill avenues, destroyed the more than one-million-square-foot facility. Firefighters were able to contain the blaze to the building, and no injuries were reported. The warehouse was filled with paper products from familiar brands like Kleenex to Huggies diapers.
Fire officials said arson was suspected almost immediately because of how quickly the fire spread inside the facility. Ontario Fire Department Chief Mike Gerken described the behavior of the fire as unusual.
“Definitely it was an uncharacteristic fire, just the fire behavior that they were experiencing inside and the rapid spread of that fire for such a large building, to move that quickly – it definitely pushed our firefighters into that defensive operation, and that was one indication that it could possibly be arson in nature,” Gerken said.
In a final clip of the video, a corridor of the warehouse appears to be engulfed in flames as the person recording states, “There goes your inventory.”
More than 24 hours later, the fire is still smoldering, creating a thick haze of smoke and ash in the immediate area.
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