After admitting to arson and assaulting a police officer, a Logan Square man who was suspected of setting Halloween decorations on fire in Roscoe Village and surrounding areas in October 2023 was given a seven-year jail sentence.
Judge Aleksandra Gillespie sentenced Mario Munoz, 34, to six years in prison after he entered a guilty plea to aggravated arson on Tuesday. According to court documents, she added a consecutive one-year sentence for a separate case in which Munoz acknowledged assaulting a peace officer.
Munoz is accused of setting a hay bale on a porch in the 2200 block of West Roscoe on fire at 3:43 a.m. on October 11, 2023, causing the floor and a column to burn. Before the fire spread, the homeowner was able to extinguish it.
A break in the case occurred days later when a resident of Roscoe Village observed Munoz near Addison and Hoyne and contacted 911, according to police, who added that surveillance footage had recorded photographs of the culprit. After stopping Munoz, officers used their body cameras to take pictures of him, which they then compared to the arsonist’s video. Later that day, he was taken into custody.
Munoz was charged with decapitating inflatable Halloween figures outside a house in the 4100 block of North Maplewood, in addition to the fire he admitted to starting. Additionally, that incident was captured on camera:
Constituents were alerted at the time by Ald. Matt Martin (47th) that Munoz was suspected of being involved in a larger pattern of at least eight arsons involving Halloween decorations that were set outside of residences. A house fire on the 3600 block of North Hoyne, which started when someone set a decorative hay bale on fire, was one of several other instances that police thought were probably related. He was never accused in any of the other fires, though.
