Man arrested for setting fire to historic Dallas building – NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

A man is facing arson charges after first responders say he intentionally set a historic Dallas building on fire Thursday afternoon.

Dallas Fire-Rescue (DFR) said they were dispatched to the Filter Building on White Rock Road at 1:48 p.m. Thursday.

Firefighters quickly extinguished a small fire on the second floor and said witnesses told them they saw a shirtless man on the roof of the building when the fire broke out.

DFR said investigators interviewed the man, 24-year-old Nsengiyumva Ngabonziza of Rwanda, who admitted setting the fire.

DFR reportedly said Ngabonziza climbed over the side of the building and got inside through a roof access hatch. He then used matches to set fire to several flammable objects in a second floor office.

Investigators said the resulting smoke forced Ngabonziza back onto the roof, where DFR found him.

DFR said Ngabonziza was arrested and charged with arson.

“You just never think something like this would happen to you — your home or a facility where you work,” said Kevin Jones, White Rock Boathouse program director.

Jones said her nonprofit, White Rock Rowing, operates the city-owned building, whose second floor is now partially charred.

He said while they are still working to assess the damage, the nearly century-old building will be expensive to repair, not to mention the equipment damaged or destroyed.

“This isn’t something where we just sweep the floor and get back to work,” Jones said. “I mean, the fire department had to cut the roof out of the building and break windows.”

Jones said on any given day there could be about 300 people in her building for rowing programs, but fortunately no one was inside at the time of the fire.

“We are so lucky that no one was in the building, that no one was injured. Anything that has been damaged is replaceable,” he said.

But Jones said they now face a funding challenge – the filter building is also a banquet hall that hosts weddings and other events. He said proceeds from these events help fund their nonprofit, allowing them to purchase rowing equipment and even offering scholarships for young athletes to take up rowing.

He said he expects events in the building to be suspended for at least a week and hopes everything can be repaired and cleaned up before the end of the main event season.

“You know, once in a lifetime something can happen, and it just happened to us,” Jones said.

Anyone who would like to support the non-profit organization during the shutdown can do so here.