Indianapolis man pleads guilty to setting deadly fire

INDIANAPOLIS -- A man pleaded guilty to reckless homicide Monday for starting a fire in a box truck that trapped himself and a dozen other housepainters in a moving inferno and fatally burned two of the men.\nTommy C. McElroy, 27, admitted causing the July 2003 fire before pleading guilty to two counts of reckless homicide and one count of criminal recklessness.\nUnder terms of a plea agreement, he faces a maximum of eight years in prison when he is sentenced Feb. 4 in Marion Superior Court.\nMcElroy and 12 other men who worked as housepainters for RPT Painting Co. of Franklin were riding in the cargo area of a box truck traveling along Interstate 465 in Indianapolis when it erupted in flames.\nProsecutors said McElroy flicked a lighter to ignite a splash of lacquer thinner that had been thrown toward a colleague as a practical joke. His action set off an explosion that turned the enclosed truck into a rolling inferno.\nThe truck's driver did not stop the truck until after the 13 men in the cargo hold began screaming and the vehicle shifted as they struggled to escape even as the truck raced along the highway near Indianapolis International Airport.\nAll of the men were seriously burned, and Otis Turner, 46, Indianapolis, and John "Jay" Webster III, 30, Greenwood, later died from their burns.\nOutside of court, fire victims and their loved ones expressed outrage at what they called an inadequate penalty for someone who caused so much agony.\n"There was too much suffering," said Joanie Green, the mother of fire victim Jason Hofstetter.\nOne of the painters inside the truck, Daniel Maple, said the chaos and pain of the fire was horrific. Maple, 34, described watching flames devour his friends while they had no way to escape.\n"My life has been totally stripped away from me," said Maple, who suffered serious burns on nearly half of his body. He blames the fire and his difficult recovery for breaking up his marriage.\n"I might as well have died in that fire," Maple said. "No sentence he will ever get will ever be enough"