Suspected arsonist and frozen sausage and elk meat thief found fully clothed in hot tub

At his court appearance last Tuesday afternoon, William Alva Riley didn't explain exactly what he was doing the morning of his alleged crime spree. Whatever it was put him fully clothed and wearing a parka, sitting in someone's hot tub. The unusual case started when Marion County Sheriff’s investigators believe Riley crashed a U-Haul truck not far from the crime scenes in Salem, Oregon.



Riley was discovered in the hot tub after he'd apparently turned off one home's electricity and the homeowner came outside to investigate. Deputies said Riley ran to hide in another neighbour's pickup truck. Looking over his property near Salem, Jim Roth believes the man suspected in the early Monday morning crime spree along his road also got into his stuff.



“I've got a couple of fuel tanks over here and he had tampered with those," he said. Roth also found stolen packages of frozen sausage and elk meat. “He was maybe trying to warm some frozen food up," he said. "And then he brought it with him over here apparently.” Jim Roth said no one knew at first that Riley had got his hands on a machete. “My neighbour there also had a machete that was missing,” Roth says, “And they noticed that after they arrested him.



“The machete was in the pickup that they actually found him in.” Roth said evidence was found everywhere, “So he had been evidently going back-and-forth between two or three different places during the course of the night and, you know, doing who knows what.” At another nearby home, there was a torched lawn mower, a burned wall and smoke damage. The residents had been on vacation and came home to find their house damaged.

With news video.