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A volunteer firefighter was taken into custody as part of an investigation into eight fires in the Hérault, but unrelated to the major fire that broke out on Tuesday in the same department, a the prosecution announced on Wednesday.
On May 26, in the early evening, three fire starts were noted in Saint-Privat, a rural town in the north of the department, said in a press release the Montpellier prosecutor, Fabrice Bélargent.
“On this occasion, a witness communicated information making it possible to identify a vehicle driving at high speed and all lights extinguished nearby”, specified the magistrate.
This same vehicle “marked a brief stop” on July 21 on a dirt road leading to Saint-Jean-de-la-Blaquière, a neighboring town, “place where a fire started a few moments later”, according to the investigations of the gendarmes of the investigation brigade of Lodève.
“A procedure for deliberate damage by fire”
The vehicle still in question was spotted again overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday in the same town of Saint-Jean-de-la-Blaquière, “concomitantly with the observation of four fire starts”, specified the prosecutor.
The owner of the vehicle, "volunteer firefighter at Sdis de l'Hérault", was placed in police custody overnight "as part of a procedure for voluntary damage by fire", added Mr. Bélargent, according to which the investigations "continue".
“It should be emphasized that the facts cited above are distinct from the major fire which started yesterday morning around the town of Gignac,” insisted the prosecutor.
This fire, for which the Montpellier prosecutor's office opened a "judicial investigation into a criminal hypothesis", burned 800 ha of Mediterranean vegetation.
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Leaving Tuesday at the end of the morning from two places 1.5 km apart, it is "now fixed", but the firefighters "remain mobilized to avoid any resumption of fire", indicated Wednesday afternoon the prefecture of Hérault in a statement.
