A 49-year-old volunteer firefighter with the Rocky Creek Volunteer Fire Department is behind bars, accused of setting a string of suspicious grass fires that burned across rural Washington County, Texas, between 2020 and 2025. Ronald Lee Perry was booked into the Washington County Jail on a $100,000 bond after investigators say a multi-agency, multi-year probe finally tied him to fires that authorities determined were of suspicious or intentional origin.
Perry was arrested on a warrant for second-degree felony arson, according to KBTX News 3. Investigators executed a search warrant on August 12 at a property on Quarry Road near Somerville, Texas, though the actual arrest happened across the county line. As KWHI reports, law enforcement apprehended Perry in neighboring Brazos County before extraditing him back to the Washington County Jail.
Authorities say the fires occurred with an unusually high frequency in rural areas of the county, a pattern that eventually drew in far more than local resources. The station's report notes that the investigation was led by local authorities alongside the Texas A&M Forest Service State Law Enforcement Investigators, the Texas Department of Public Safety Ranger Division, and the FBI Central Texas Joint Terrorism Task Force. That level of interagency firepower, sustained over several years, underscores how difficult it was for investigators to pin the fires on a single suspect.
A Firefighter Accused of Betraying His Own Department
Perry's alleged ties to the very department that would have responded to these blazes have hit especially hard among local fire officials. Following the arrest, Rocky Creek Volunteer Fire Department Assistant Chief Tim Hamff issued a joint statement with the Washington County Firefighters Association, per the same account, calling the allegations a “serious violation of the public's trust” that contradicts the core values of the fire service. Rocky Creek and other agencies were expected to share a fuller joint statement later the same day.
The betrayal cuts deeper in a county like Washington, where rural fire protection depends almost entirely on volunteers. Washington County relies on a network of 10 primary volunteer fire departments — including Rocky Creek, Burton, Gay Hill, Prairie Hill, and Salem — to provide fire coverage and mutual aid across the county, according to Washington County records. Those departments depend on public trust and community goodwill to keep operating.
What Perry Is Facing Under Texas Law
Second-degree felony arson of open-space land or vegetation carries a statutory penalty of 2 to 20 years in state prison and a maximum fine of $10,000 upon conviction, under Texas Penal Code § 28.02, according to FindLaw. That charge could be enhanced significantly if any of the fires under investigation are ultimately tied to injuries or occupied structures. Texas law elevates arson to a first-degree felony — carrying 5 to 99 years or life imprisonment — if a fire causes bodily injury or death, or if the targeted property is a habitation, place of worship, or place of assembly.
It remains unclear exactly how many specific fire incidents investigators have linked to the warrant against Perry, and whether additional charges or co-defendants could emerge as the case moves forward. Perry's formal plea status has also not yet been established heading into upcoming court proceedings.
A Familiar, Troubling Pattern in the Fire Service
Cases like Perry's are not isolated within the fire service nationally. National fire safety experts and the National Volunteer Fire Council estimate that roughly 100 firefighters across North America are arrested or convicted each year for setting intentional fires, with profilers noting that most firefighter arsonists are serial offenders, as reported by CBC News. Research from the National Volunteer Fire Council has found that firefighter-involved arson inflicts severe institutional damage, undermining community trust, lowering volunteer morale, and hindering local fundraising efforts that rural departments depend on to survive.
The stakes for wildland fire response in Texas are considerable on their own. More than 5,500 wildfires ignited statewide in fiscal year 2025, prompting wildland firefighters to deploy to hundreds of emergency incidents, per MyParisTexas. The Texas A&M Forest Service Law Enforcement Department, which assisted in the Washington County investigation, operates a specialized unit of commissioned peace officers who conducted 151 wildfire origin and arson investigations statewide in fiscal year 2025 alone.
KBTX and the Brenham Banner Press both obtained information about the arrest and the broader investigation as the case developed. For now, Perry remains held on the $100,000 bond in the Washington County Jail as the grand jury reviews the evidence gathered over five years of suspicious fires across the county's rural landscape.
