Accused serial arsonist behind bars in Obion Co.
OBION COUNTY, Tenn. — An accused arsonist in Obion County is now catching heat from the law.
“Someone is going around setting all the fires, everyone’s hay is on fire,” witness Jerry Cunningham said.
Thursday, Obion County Emergency Officials spent the day putting out six fires and searching for a man they consider to be mentally-ill.
“We actually had a man who was pulling off on the side of the road, throwing gasoline down on the side of the road and lighting it and then driving off,” Obion County Emergency Director Danny Jowers confirmed.
An all day search that led to the arrest of Mark Grooms, who Jowers said has had a previous run-ins with the law.
“He has mental issues, obviously he does or he wouldn’t be setting fires. But he does have mental issues he has been in our correctional facility before,” Jowers said.
The sheriff’s department said Grooms is from Obion County and no one was injured or structures damaged.
“Mine was burning big time when I got here,” Cunningham said.
One of the six fires happened on his property.
“I saw the smoke and I came down to see what was burning and it was my hay,” Cunningham said. “He’s going to be in a lot of trouble, he better find him someplace to get.”
A community is thankful they have a suspected arsonist behind bars.
“I didn’t have all that many, wasn’t about 15 (bales of hay) here. I have about 150, just right up the road and evidently they didn’t see them or they were in too big of a hurry because they didn’t set them on fire,” Cunnigham said.
“We’re not in the same situation as East Tennessee. We have had quite a bit of rain. Our grass and leaves have a little more moisture but it doesn’t matter all we have to do is lose one house because of this and that’s not good,” Jowers said.
Investigators told WBBJ 7 Eyewitness News, Grooms is behind bars in Obion County and faces six counts of arson.
Obion County officials would not go into details of Grooms’ prior arrest history, but did say it had to deal with mail boxes.
