The still images taken from a video show an older white male with a receding hairline and shoulder-length ponytail. He is wearing a black jacket and black pants. (LA Times)
Los Angeles police are looking for a ponytailed man as a suspect in the recent arson spree.
CBS News reported:
Police in Los Angeles distributed DVDs on Sunday featuring surveillance video of a man wanted for questioning in connection with a rash of suspicious car fires in the city.
The person of interest is a white male between 20 and 30 years old with a receding hairline and a shoulder-length ponytail, according to Officer Sara Faden. The man was seen on video Saturday after emerging on foot from inside an underground parking structure on Hollywood Boulevard that was the scene of a car fire.
Detectives estimated the man, who was wearing a bulky jacket, is between 5’6″ and 6’1″ tall.
Faden said investigators are asking for the public’s help in identifying the man on the video.
Detectives spent early Sunday analyzing security video camera footage and following up on other leads after a half dozen more vehicles were set on fire on New Year’s Eve.
The outbreak of arson fires has left a trail of smoldering debris in Hollywood, West Hollywood, North Hollywood and the Fairfax district of Los Angeles since Thursday.
Authorities said they were investigating a total of 43 suspicious fires. Most of those fires were set in parked cars. In several cases, flames have jumped to carports and apartment units.
“They are working on hundreds of clues, interviewing dozens of witnesses, picking up countless pieces of evidence,” police Cmdr. Andrew Smith said of the detectives.
