Two teenagers are under arrest in Western Wisconsin, accused of lighting multiple mailboxes on fire. The Barron County Sheriff’s Office says complaints about damaged mailboxes started coming in yesterday afternoon and the details from Sheriff Fitzgerald are below:
Thursday, December 26, 2024, just after 3:00 p.m., the Barron County 911 center started to receive calls of mailboxes being damaged, burned and destroyed at several locations in the northern part of the county.
Deputies from the Sheriff’s Department along with the WI State Patrol started to patrol the area and took six complaints of mail and mailboxes being lite on fire and destroyed. A possible plate and description of the truck was given out and due to the location of the incidents, the dispatch center notified Washburn County to check the area.
Just after 4:00 p.m., the Washburn County Sheriff’s Office and a WI State Patrol Trooper stopped a possible suspect vehicle near Shell Lake. A subsequent investigation lead to the arrest of a 17 year old male from Webster and a 15 year old from Cambridge, MN. Several items of evidence were recovered in the vehicle including mail and packages removed from the mailboxes. Information is being forwarded to the US Postal Inspector for any possible charges from their department.
William Johnson, 17 of Webster is being held in the Barron County Jail on several counts of Arson and is awaiting formal charges by the Barron County District Attorney’s Office next week. The 15 year old is being referred to Barron County Health and Human Services for charges of Party to the Crime of Arson.
This case remains under investigation along with several other similar cases in Barron County and surrounding counties.
