By Jan Hefler
The Philadelphia Inquirer
PHILADELPHIA — It has been almost two years since Jason Henry was arrested on charges that he killed his parents by torching the family’s Glassboro home.
Henry, who was 16 at the time, told police through sobs that he set the blaze because his mother and father were both ill and they could collect on their homeowners’ insurance to pay medical bills.
Though his confession — and how it was extracted — is expected to be key at the teenager’s trial, it now appears that the courtroom drama could include a battle between scientific experts. Each side has brought in experts to determine how the fire started and spread through the ranch home.
Henry, a Glassboro High School honors student and former Boy Scout, is accused of dousing his parents’ bedroom with gasoline as they slept on the night of Feb. 13, 2007.
Police say accelerant was spread in that room, the living room and a computer room. The house was gutted in the 1 a.m. fire.
Jeffrey Wintner, Henry’s public defender, said at a status hearing in Superior Court in Gloucester County last week that he had hired experts to analyze a report prepared last year by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The ATFE re-created the fire at its laboratory in Rockville, Md., to look for burn patterns.
At the defense’s request, Judge M. Christine Allen-Jackson has scheduled a hearing for Feb. 19, when the re-examination of the ATFE findings should be complete. No trial date has been set.
Wintner would not comment on the experts’ findings. Bernie Weisenfeld, spokesman for the prosecutor, said the prosecutor would not comment on the case before the trial.
Henry is charged with arson and the murder of his parents, Michelle Henry, 39, and Stephen Edwards, 43, who suffered severe burns and died at Crozer-Chester Medical Center within a week. Henry has been held at Gloucester County Juvenile Detention Center since his arrest the day after the fire.
In his taped confession, made without a lawyer present, the high school sophomore told investigators that he had assumed his parents would escape the flames. He said he had poured accelerant around his bed, which was in the basement, and said the fire ignited when he tossed the gas can into a wood stove.
Friends of Henry’s mother said she had just told her son that she was giving up her six-year battle with leukemia and planned to stop chemotherapy.
Family friends have questioned whether the teen, whom they called a loving son, could have snapped.
Henry’s father, a tractor-trailer driver, had a bad back and other ailments, and he had complained that family finances were stretched.
During his interrogation, Jason Henry wondered if his father staged the fire for the insurance money. Edwards joked about doing it during Michelle Henry’s last hospital visit, his son said.
Henry’s grandmother, Margaret Henry, accompanied the teen to the police station for questioning before his arrest. She declined to be interviewed last week.
Dina Hollingsworth, whose son was close with Jason Henry, also did not want to comment last week other than to say that the case “really is dragging out.” In interviews, Hollingsworth — who has attended most of Henry’s court hearings — has described him as a “good son.” She doubts he could have set the fire, Hollingsworth has said.
The judge directed prosecutor Dana Anton to bring a plea offer to the table at the next hearing. Wintner said no negotiations had taken place.
Wintner said he had not yet decided whether to file a motion to have Henry’s confession dismissed as evidence.
Wintner has said he believes the confession was coerced and is not credible because of several inconsistencies. Henry repeatedly denied setting the fire and was hounded by investigators into admitting that he was responsible, his lawyer has said.
After his confession, with police gone from the room and the video camera still recording, Henry assured his grandmother that he was innocent. He had given up trying to convince police, he said. The tape abruptly stops at the point where Margaret Henry asked her grandson to explain.
Police, however, point out that Henry’s socks were soaked with gasoline and that he escaped the intense blaze only with burns on one hand.
In May 2007, Superior Court Judge Mary White ruled that Henry could be tried as an adult, citing the severity of the charges. He faces up to life imprisonment if convicted.
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