By William Bender
The Philadelphia Daily News
COATESVILLE, Pa. — Mike Zuratt has equipped his Coatesville home with motion-sensor lights, eight smoke detectors, three fire extinguishers and two outdoor surveillance cameras that are rigged to an old VCR.
He still doesn’t feel safe. Nor should he.
The arsonists who have waged war on Zuratt’s Chester County city are continuing their late-night assaults despite an intensifying federal investigation. He lives in the city’s West End — smack in the middle of the Red Zone.
“This place is starting to look like Beirut,” said the 51-year-old electronics technician said. “Every corner, there’s a burnt-up house.”
From his front porch, Zuratt gazed past the old Lukens Steel mill at a house that was torched in December, then across the street at two homes that were targeted early Saturday morning, nearly trapping a family of five inside. His own back porch was set ablaze in February 2008.
“It totally blows my mind, somebody sneaking up in the middle of the night and setting a house on fire, knowing there are people inside,” Zuratt said. “Somebody’s getting their jollies off of that? What a sick person.”
“I hear people say this ain’t terrorism,” he added, “but I consider it terrorism.”
Some Coatesville residents had begun to let their guard down after last month’s arrests of Roger Barlow Jr., 20, a technical school student, and his friend, Mark Gilliam, 19, a wannabe firefighter who was spurned by the West Bradford Fire Company.
Authorities say Barlow — who had initially implicated Gilliam — is responsible for at least nine of the 68 arsons that have ravaged Coatesville and surrounding communities in the last 12 months. Both men are in custody. The city lifted its curfew last week after a month-long lull in deliberately set fires.
But at the first night-time opportunity following Barlow’s preliminary hearing, someone set fire to two homes on Valley Road around 1:30 a.m. Saturday — the city’s 20th arson this year. Another front yard was left strewn with charred furniture, clothes and toys.
“Now it’s scary all over again,” said 2nd Avenue resident Helen Lawrence, whose daughter’s house was nearly consumed by the Jan. 24 fire that gutted 15 row houses on Fleetwood Street. That block was declared a federal disaster area last week.
“Back to not sleeping again,” said Madison Street resident Robert Hill, whose house is sandwiched between two arson sites. “Everybody thought it was over.”
“They got that house, they got his backyard, they got his patio furniture,” Hill said, pointing to the homes of neighborhood victims and explaining how he and his wife take turns sleeping at night.
Government officials are worried that the fires could hamper redevelopment efforts in the economically distressed steel town of about 11,600 residents.
“Our citizens are extremely fearful, some sleeping in shifts, and unsure of who is going to be next,” said city spokeswoman Kristin Geiger. “All of those things come into play when you’re talking about turning the city around and moving toward revitalization.”
While some residents are considering relocating, Zuratt is standing his ground, even though his home is starting to feel more like a bunker. In a city of less than two square miles, it’s probably only a matter of time before the arsonists are caught.
“I paid 20 years on my mortgage,” he said. “They ain’t gonna run me out.”
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