A former college football player ran down a suspected arsonist, and Los Angeles firefighters tackled hillside flames before the burning brush could get out of control, officials said Tuesday.
One-time University of Kentucky wide receiver Scott Mitchell and girlfriend Davanah DiMarco were out on their regular 7-mile hike on Sunday when they came upon a burning tree and a suspicious, disheveled man leaving the scene.
“‘Oh wait, that tree’s on fire,'” Mitchell recalled DiMarco telling him. “‘Hey, that guy lit that tree on fire. He started that fire. Get him!’ ”
By this point, that man was about 150 yards down the road. And then all of a sudden, Mitchell found himself back on an SEC gridiron in the fall of 2004 or 2005.
“Even without digging, I was able to chase that guy down,” Mitchell told NBC News. “I didn’t know I still had it, I’m not going to lie.”
The man told the couple he was a fire marshal and started the blaze as part of a controlled burn — a tale they didn’t believe given his disheveled state.
“So I asked him, ‘Where’s your badge, fire marshal?'” said Mitchell, a talent manager. “And there was nobody else over there, so you can reasonably deduct that he set the fire.”
Other hikers on the trail helped keep the man at bay and called 911.
Andrew Wistic O’Calliham, a 43-year-old homeless man, was booked on suspicion of arson upon a structure or forest land, jail records showed.
He was being held in lieu of $75,000 bail on Tuesday.
Aerial personnel and about 53 firefighters on the ground “fully extinguished all active flames” along Runyon Canyon Road in the Hollywood Hills on Sunday afternoon, according to an LAFD statement.
Mitchell and DiMarco were evacuated during the devastating Eaton Fire earlier this year, so they’re hyper-sensitive to smell or sight of any flames.
“Yeah we’re grateful that it ended the way it did,” said DiMarco, a fashion designer.
Lindsay Good and Helen Kwong contributed.
