Photo from Northern California wildfire thought to show arson suspect

A 20-year-old Ukiah man was arrested Tuesday on suspicion of intentionally setting a fire that burned homes and forced hundreds to flee the Mendocino County town of Calpella.

He is apparently the same man seen in a photo watching the flames from a bridge over the Russian River.

In announcing the arrest, Mendocino County sheriff’s Capt. Greg Van Patten said surveillance video from a business showed a man starting the fire Sunday afternoon on Hopkins Street near the Moore Street Bridge.

The fire, called Hopkins, was reported around 2:15 p.m. Sunday, and the first evacuation orders came within half an hour.

On Tuesday, shortly after 11 a.m., a fire investigator saw a man matching the arsonist’s description in Calpella. He was detained and identified as being on probation for an attempted robbery charge, Van Patten said.

The man, being held without bail, is accused of violating probation and three arson charges: aggravated arson (multiple structures), arson of an inhabited structure, and arson during a state of emergency.

An image from Peter Armstrong, who was photographing the scene, shows a man — likely the suspect — watching the early stages of the fire from the Moore Street Bridge.

Van Patten said he could not be “100 percent sure” the photo shows the suspect but that “investigators did receive information today that he was photographed on the Moore Street Bridge” during the fire.

Evacuation orders remain in place for the fire, which has threatened hundreds of homes. Fire officials have not reported how many buildings have been destroyed, but residents on social media are saying it was at least a dozen.

As of Tuesday evening, the Hopkins Fire was at 257 acres with 60% containment, said the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.