The reward for information leading to an arrest in a series of arson fires in this Orange County town has been increased from $1,000 to $5,000, state officials announced Monday.
Since September 1997, 15 arson or suspected arson fires have been set in Leipsic, a town of about 30 homes located 35 miles southeast of Bloomington. No one has been injured.
The first of the arson fires occurred on Sept. 6, when the vacant home of Phillip Foutch was heavily damaged hours after Foutch was convicted of conspiracy to commit murder in the shooting death of an Orleans man.
A second fire Oct. 31 destroyed what was left of the house.
Town residents had speculated that the fires may have been set by someone with a grudge against Foutch, a hunch largely abandoned when the fires continued after Foutch, 59, died Jan. 16 of a heart attack at the Wabash Valley Correctional Center in Carlisle.
The most recent fire, on June 14, burned a hay barn. The reward is being offered by the Indiana Arson and Crime Association, which is funded by insurance companies that operate in Indiana.
