## Facts

- Patrick Boggs and his wife lived with their two-year-old daughter in a trailer.
- After an argument, Boggs repeatedly struck his wife inside the trailer.
- Boggs poured roughly half of a five-gallon container of kerosene on her and waved a lit cigarette lighter near her while she was soaked.
- She retreated to the bathroom; Boggs followed, hit her again, and again held the lit lighter near her.
- Boggs falsely told her her pants were on fire; she panicked, attempted to remove them, and fell into the bathtub.
- Boggs struck her several more times, poured the remaining kerosene on her while she lay in the tub, and again brought the lit lighter near her.
- The lighter fell or was dropped into the bathtub and went out before igniting the kerosene; no flames erupted.
- At trial, an expert testified that ignition of one to two gallons of kerosene inside the trailer would have engulfed the trailer in flames.
- A jury found Boggs guilty of aggravated arson, arson, felonious assault, and domestic violence, and not guilty of endangering children.
- On direct appeal, Boggs challenged only the aggravated arson and arson convictions as unsupported by sufficient evidence because no “fire” occurred.

## Issues

1. Whether sufficient evidence supported aggravated arson and arson convictions where kerosene did not ignite and no open flames resulted.
2. Whether Ohio’s arson statutes require proof of actual combustion/burning, rather than proof that the defendant knowingly created a substantial risk of serious physical harm “by means of fire.”

## Decision

- The court affirmed the aggravated arson and arson convictions.
- The court held the evidence permitted a rational jury to find that Boggs knowingly created a substantial risk of serious physical harm by means of fire, despite the absence of ignition.
- The court concluded that the lighter’s failure to ignite the kerosene did not defeat the arson elements because the statutes focus on risk creation, not successful burning.

## Legal Principles

- Under Ohio’s sufficiency standard, a conviction stands if, viewing the evidence most favorably to the prosecution, any rational trier of fact could find the essential elements proven beyond a reasonable doubt.
- Aggravated arson under R.C. 2909.02(A)(1) is satisfied where a defendant knowingly creates, by means of fire or explosion, a substantial risk of serious physical harm to another person; actual ignition is not required.
- A defendant’s deliberate use of an open flame in close proximity to a highly flammable accelerant, in a confined structure, can constitute “by means of fire” and support a finding of substantial risk even when no burning occurs.

## Conclusion

The court upheld Boggs’s arson-related convictions because intentionally dousing a person with kerosene in a trailer and repeatedly bringing a lit lighter near the fuel-soaked victim was sufficient evidence that he knowingly created a substantial risk of serious physical harm by means of fire, even though the kerosene never ignited.


State v. Boggs, No. 2002-L-164, 2003-Ohio-6968, 2003 WL 22994531 (Ohio Ct. App. 11th Dist. Dec. 19, 2003)