The suspected arsonist who burned down a LGBT youth center in Arizona on July 12 is reportedly a former member who aged out of the system.
A video recording of the incident reportedly shows 26-year-old Darren William Beach Jr. approaching the one.n.ten Phoenix LGBT youth center with a can of gasoline in hand. The recording also shows him pouring out the gasoline into multiple rooms in the center:
In a press briefing on Wednesday, one.n.ten executive director Linda Elliott said the arsonist used the center's services starting in 2013, but aged out of the program in 2016.
Elliott said it was a “total shock” to recognize Beach in the video, as he had shared his admiration for the one.n.ten center before.
“It’s a youth who we’ve helped over the years who had never shown this kind of behavior in the past, so someone that you’ve provided services to and helped out, you just would not expect to come back to your center and do this sort of thing,” Elliott said.
A statement on the one.n.ten page reiterates that the suspect in the incident is a “young man who we had served off and on from 2013 to early 2016.”
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