Fire starting 101 says you need wood. Christopher Peden, a 36-year-old from Fort Wayne, Indiana, had a very specific interpretation of that rule.
According to court documents reported by FOX 59, Peden entered a neighbor’s detached garage on May 6, cut off his own penis with a kitchen knife, poured gasoline on it, and set it on fire on the garage floor just inside the door. He then walked away, encountered police, and told them he’d been stabbed somewhere in downtown Fort Wayne. Investigators collected a red plastic gas container, four lighters, and a kitchen knife from the garage. The stabbing claim did not hold up long after that.
Peden subsequently told investigators he had been “dishonest” about the stabbing and “wanted to be truthful,” according to court documents. He was charged with arson, a Level 4 felony, and has a court hearing scheduled for next week.
No Word as to What Motivated Him to Use His Penis to Commit Arson
It’s the arson charge that deserves a moment of appreciation. Not the self-amputation, not the gasoline, not the four lighters—the arson. What Peden allegedly did to himself is legally distinct from what he’s accused of doing to the garage, and it’s the garage that got him arrested. Indiana law defines arson as knowingly or intentionally damaging property by means of fire. Peden technically accomplished that. He just used the most unexpected delivery system in the documented history of the charge.
The property owners told police a neighbor woke them up to alert them to the fire, and that they noticed a family member—Peden—was missing. No motive for the garage fire has been publicly established. No explanation for the self-amputation has been offered either, which is arguably the more pressing of the two unanswered questions here.
Peden was taken to a hospital. The garage sustained fire damage. The kitchen knife, the gas can, and four lighters are now sitting in an evidence locker somewhere in Fort Wayne. Whatever Christopher Peden was trying to accomplish on the night of May 6, the legal system is now tasked with making sense of it. That’s going to be some crazy paperwork.
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