The Chico man suspected of sparking the Park Fire last week, which has burned over 380,000 acres of Northern California, has now been charged with felony arson and arson with aggravating factors.
Ronnie Dean Stout II, 42, was arraigned Monday in Butte County Suprerior Court, and prosecutors added an enhancement to his arson charges, noting that this is his third strike — which under California law could send him to prison for 25 years to life. He is being held without bail.
As we learned after his arrest last week, Stout has prior convictions for child molestation (2001) and armed robbery with great bodily injury (2002). For the latter case, Stout served 20 years in prison, and a neighbor had suggested that he had only been out and living with his mother in Chico for about 18 months.
The Park Fire was sparked on Wednesday, July 24, and investigators have said that Stout was seen pushing a flaming car — a 2007 Toyota Yaris — into a ravine known as the "Alligator Hole" in Bidwell Park. The car fell 60 feet and burst into further flames, which ignited the blaze that has now scorched 383,619 acres of Butte, Tehama, Shasta, and Plumas counties. It is the fifth largest wildfire in state history, following a disturbing pattern of the last few years that have produced five other, massive, record-setting fires, and it could soon rise further in those ranks.
As the Chronicle reports, witnesses have told investigators that they saw Stout driving recklessly, while heavily intoxicated, in another area of Bidwell Park shortly before the start of the fire. Stout has reportedly claimed that the fire began accidentally after the car became stuck on some rocks and he was revving the engine.
Investigators says that Stout's blood-alcohol level was still above the legal limit when he was arrested, which was 12 hours after the start of the fire.
The car reportedly belonged to Stout's mother, who lives in a trailer park in the Bidwell Park area.
The fire, now in its sixth day, continues to burn to the north and northeast, as well as to the east in the direction of Butte Meadows, a tiny town of about 40 people near the Tehama County line.
As Cal Fire said in an update Tuesday, "The perimeter of the Park Fire is 260 miles which means it has burned more than 3 times the surface area of Lake Tahoe."
The Chronicle has a map showing the concentration of the current hotspots along the eastern and northeastern fronts of the fire.
More than 5,500 firefighting personnel are now battling the blaze, which has destroyed at least 192 structures.
With 13,000 more acres, the Park Fire will surpass 2020's SCU Complex fire, which is currently ranked as the state's fourth-largest fire, having burned 397,000 acres.
