Apartment Building

A 25-year-old Middletown, Md., man has been charged with setting a Saturday morning fire that trapped several people on an upper story of the Washington Garden Apartments, Hagerstown Police said. Jason Todd Burkett, 25, was charged with first- and second-degree arson and resisting arrest, police said. The Hagerstown Fire Department responded to the fire at about 6:30 a.m. Saturday, police said. Firefighters found a fire in the stairwell of the apartment building and quickly put it out, police said.

A fire on Saturday night at an apartment building in Pinewood Apartments caused the left side of the roof of the building to cave in. The fire at 507 Lynnehaven Drive, off Security Road, was caused by lightning, said Richard Miller, assistant fire marshal with the Hagerstown Fire Department. No serious injuries were reported in the blaze, which was reported about 9:15 p.m. Miller said there might have been one person with a minor injury. Firefighters from the Hagerstown Fire Department and the Long Meadow Fire Co. responded, as well as personnel with Washington County Emergency Services and Hagerstown Fire Police.

WAYNESBORO, Pa. - A Waynesboro man died Wednesday night after falling from the roof of his two-story apartment building at 121 Walnut St., according to Ray Shultz, chief of the Waynesboro Police Department. James F. Smith III, 35, was pronounced dead at the scene at 10:12 p.m., Franklin County Coroner Jeffrey R. Conner said. The cause of death was blunt force head trauma, he said. The Waynesboro Police Department received a call Wednesday at 9:25 p.m. reporting the incident and responded at 9:28 p.m., Shultz said.

WILLIAMSPORT Five people were displaced from their homes Sunday when flames swept through the third floor of a downtown Williamsport apartment building, according to fire officials and a report from the Maryland State Fire Marshal. Capt. Kevin Lewis, who was the incident commander on the scene for Williamsport Fire and Emergency Medical Services, said residents of three units planned to stay with family members after the two-alarm blaze. "We were standing here and heard a ... pop or gunfire, and the next thing we know, we saw smoke and flames coming out of the building," said Dean Martin, an East Salisbury Street resident who stood in an alley between his home and the back of the building, watching as firefighters tended to smoldering debris.

WILLIAMSPORT - Five people were displaced from their homes Sunday when flames swept through the third floor of a downtown Williamsport apartment building, according to fire officials and a report from the Maryland State Fire Marshal. Capt. Kevin Lewis, who was the incident commander on the scene for Williamsport Fire and Emergency Medical Services, said residents of three units planned to stay with family members after the two-alarm blaze. "We were standing here and heard a ... pop or gunfire, and the next thing we know, we saw smoke and flames coming out of the building," said Dean Martin, an East Salisbury Street resident who stood in an alley between his home and the back of the building, watching as firefighters tended to smoldering debris.

HAGERSTOWN - Three families were left without a home Saturday afternoon after fire damaged an apartment building at 145 S. Prospect St. No one was injured in the fire, which was called in Saturday around 12:30 p.m., said Ron Horn, deputy chief of the Hagerstown Fire Department. All three apartments in the three-story structure suffered "extensive damage," Horn said. The cause of the fire was not determined Saturday. John Huntzberry, 17, was showering in his second-floor apartment when he smelled smoke.

Two men were arrested at Youngstoun Apartments Friday night after police cleared a building on a tip that a man wanted in connection with a shooting in Frederick County, Va., was inside an apartment there, Washington County Sheriff Douglas Mullendore said. Edward Irving Brown, 25, was wanted in connection with a nonfatal shooting on Friday in the 2400 block of Martinsburg Pike near Winchester, Va., according to reports. Brown and Eric Vondell Carter, 25, who was wanted on traffic and drug charges, were taken into custody at Youngstoun Apartments without incident Friday about 11 p.m., Mullendore said.

HAGERSTOWN - A Hagerstown woman was in the intensive care unit of Washington County Hospital on Tuesday after the vehicle she was driving collided with an oil truck and was pushed into a residential building at the corner of East Franklin and North Mulberry streets at about 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, according to Hagerstown Police. Julie Kugler-Bentley was alone in a Chevrolet Suburban when the vehicle collided with an M&M Oil truck driven by Franklin J. Brown of Inwood, W.Va., police said.

State emergency and county health officials said Thursday that they are satisfied with the way in which a health scare in downtown Hagerstown was handled Wednesday. Twelve African refugees and three other people were evacuated from a West Franklin Street apartment building Wednesday afternoon on the suspicion they had a contagious illness, which turned out to be a false alarm complicated by a language barrier. A doctor who examined the group in decontamination tents set up near the apartment building at 25 1/2 W. Franklin St. determined "no one was suffering from something that posed some type of threat," Washington County Health Department spokesman Rod MacRae said.