Firefighter trainee charged with arson

CHICAGO (AP) - A 19-year-old suburban Chicago man training to be a firefighter has been charged with setting fires to vacant homes that he later helped extinguish.

In a news release, the Cook County Sheriff's Department says Kaumain Allen of Ford Heights was arrested on three counts of arson after allegedly setting fires in the same community.

It says the investigation started Monday after a sheriff's deputy who had seen Allen at a building learned that the Ford Heights Fire Department had not sent him there to retrieve equipment as Allen had told the officer.

The investigation revealed that Allen had allegedly set fire to three homes before later returning to put the fires out.

He's scheduled to appear in court Thursday. It was not immediately known if he had an attorney.