Two minors arrested after Gilbert family garage fire

GILBERT, AZ — Two teenagers were arrested on charges of endangerment and arson of an occupied structure after a Gilbert family's garage was set on fire Wednesday night, according to Gilbert police.

Around 10 p.m. Wednesday, Gilbert firefighters were alerted to a fire at a family barn near Higley and Guadalupe roads.

When firefighters arrived on scene, they found a large, isolated building engulfed in flames. The fire was extinguished a short time later and no injuries were reported, according to Gilbert fire officials.

Jeni Jones was inside her home when she saw the family garage, which is separate from her house, catch fire. Minutes earlier, her teenage daughter was on the second floor of the house with a group of friends.

The video in the player below shows the fire and was provided to ABC15 by homeowner Jeni Jones

“They were back in the attic at 9:48 a.m.,” Jones said. “I called 9-1-1 at 9:52 a.m. They barely made it out.”

In videos shared by Jones, the garage door can be seen bursting open by the force of the fire inside and smoke billowing from every crack in the structure.

By the time Gilbert firefighters arrived, the blaze had grown so large that the garage — and the hundreds of thousands of dollars of family possessions it contained — was a total loss.

No one was injured in the incident, but after speaking with the Jones family, Gilbert police arrested two teenagers who Jones said were part of a group of boys who entered the family's property Wednesday night. Jones told ABC15 that two of the teens admitted to throwing fireworks into the garage, even though they knew Jones' daughter and her friends were inside.

Jones said the two boys arrested were friends with his daughter and had spent time with the family on boat trips and in the garage.

She said one of the boys in particular began harassing her daughter and saying things she deemed inappropriate, so Jones told her daughter to disconnect from him.

“I told him to block him, to have nothing to do with him,” she said. “And then it happened.”

After the barn burned down, Jones said one of the boys sent his daughter a Snapchat of him giving her the finger, then deleted the message.

It is unclear whether the two arrested teens have been released or charged with a crime, or whether Gilbert is investigating the other teens who were at the scene Wednesday night.

“Last night I was really sick to my stomach. I was in shock,” Jones said. “It was really heartbreaking.”

In Wednesday's fire, Jones' husband's classic car collection, much of her clothing, her recently deceased mother's hand-me-downs, the family's CrossFit gym equipment, her engraving machine and countless other sentimental family heirlooms were destroyed.

“My daughter’s very first snowboard, when she was four or five,” she recalls. “We said we’d save it for our future grandchildren. So it’s gone.”

As the Gilbert community continues to deal with the aftermath of the murder of 16-year-old Preston Lord by the so-called “Gilbert Goons” last year, Jones is demanding that parents and the community step in to prevent more teens from being harmed by their peers.

“One of the officers asked me if I thought they were part of the Gilbert Goons,” she said. “I don’t necessarily think they are, but they definitely have this mentality of, ‘We come from a wealthy family, we can do whatever we want. We play sports in high school, we’re popular, we can do whatever we want and we don’t have to get in trouble.’”

Jones is asking that the teens involved in the fire be charged and she also plans to seek protective orders against them as her daughter prepares to return to high school in the fall.

Gilbert police say the investigation is ongoing.