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A Howard County jury has convicted a 71-year-old Ellicott City man, the former police chief of the city of Laurel, with setting a string of fires against people who prosecutors say he believed had slighted him.
David Crawford was convicted of eight counts of attempted first-degree murder and two counts of arson. The verdict followed a six-day trial.
Howard County State’s Attorney Richard Gibson said prosecutors would seek eight life sentences at Crawford’s scheduled June sentencing.
”This person should’ve been a guardian and a protector,” Gibson said outside the Howard County Circuit Courthouse. “Instead, he was a menace.”
Though on trial with fires that were set in Howard County, prosecutors told jurors of a string of fires that they said Crawford set across six Maryland counties, spanning almost a decade.
Crawford’s defense attorney Robert Bonsib had argued that there wasn’t sufficient evidence to link Crawford to the fires, and that it couldn’t be proven that Crawford intended to kill anyone. He called the fires “nuisance fires.”
“Just because he’s bad at murder, he doesn’t get a pass,” Assistant State’s Attorney Scott Hammond said in response.
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While there was little evidence to physically tie Crawford to the fires, prosecutors said there was ample circumstantial evidence: Crawford’s cellphone contained a list of the people whose homes were set ablaze — relatives, former coworkers, neighbors, even his chiropractor. His iPad and home computer also showed searches for the targets’ addresses around the dates of the fires, and a posting to a medical forum two weeks after one fire in which he asked how to treat a second-degree burn.
Prosecutors believe Crawford left his phone at home when he ventured out into the early morning darkness to set the fires, leaving them without cell tower or GPS location data. But data from a fitness app that tracks steps showed Crawford moving about during early morning hours of some of the fires.
He also had calendar reminders, such as “McLaughlin fire,” in his phone that correspond to several of the fires.
The case didn’t start with such evidence. Crawford had avoided detection — even suspicion — for years. Hammond said it was a 2019 fire at the home of Crawford’s successor as Laurel police chief, Richard McLaughlin, that ramped up the investigation. The arsonist was captured on home surveillance video walking down McLaughlin’s driveway and pouring gasoline between two cars.
“People started to feel like they could recognize him from that,” Hammond said in an interview.
Investigators then realized a link between McLaughlin and another victim of arson in Montgomery County, Crawford’s stepson. “It’s weird to have two people have an arson that have a connection in between,” Hammond said.
Assistant State’s Attorney Tricia Cecil said investigators got a search warrant for Crawford’s electronic devices, revealing the target list. “The list really broke it open,” Cecil said. “They were able to look at names on the list and see if those people were victims of arson.”
The targets of the fires included his successor as Laurel police chief, Laurel’s city administrator, and former colleagues in the Prince George’s County Police Department, as well as a woman prosecutors say Crawford had a disagreement with about school redistricting.
One woman, a director of a court program for children, is listed as “white privilege,” a reference to a disagreement she had with Crawford’s wife. After Crawford’s wife took offense at a judge’s use of the term “white privilege,” the woman asked her not to participate in the program, according to charging documents.
Bonsib, however, said that most of the victims couldn’t fathom any reason why Crawford would target them.
“By all accounts, they had an amicable relationship,” Bonsib said of Crawford’s former chiropractor, Russell Antico. He said Crawford and another woman, who was said to have clashed with Crawford over Howard County school redistricting, were actually on the same page.
But prosecutors in earlier court filings said there were minor provocations — like not being invited to a pool party, in one instance — that the victims say could have been the catalyst. Bonsib said the victims were reaching in hindsight to offer possible explanations.
Crawford did not take the stand and his attorney called no witnesses.
Crawford previously pleaded guilty in March 2022 to one count of first-degree arson brought in Frederick County. He entered an Alford plea, acknowledging there was enough evidence to convict him but maintaining his innocence. Sentencing in that case was scheduled for early April.
justin.fenton@thebaltimorebanner.com
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Justin Fenton is an investigative reporter for the Baltimore Banner. He previously spent 17 years at the Baltimore Sun, covering the criminal justice system. His book, "We Own This City: A True Story of Crime, Cops and Corruption," was released by Random House in 2021 and became an HBO miniseries.
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