SAN ANTONIO – A man admitted to starting a fire at his estranged wife’s new boyfriend’s home on Jan. 12.
San Antonio police said Billy Quezada, 41, used a gas can to start the fire just before 11 a.m. in the 940 block of E. Drexel Avenue, not far from S Gevers Street and I-10.
According to an arrest warrant affidavit, Quezada found out his estranged wife was in a new relationship with a previous acquaintance.
Quezada spoke on the phone with his ex around 10 a.m. and the San Antonio Fire Department was dispatched to a structure fire one hour later at the new boyfriend’s address.
An initial investigation couldn’t pinpoint the reason the blaze ignited due to the severity of damage to the structure, which was a building that the victim planned to convert into living quarters for his mother.
According to the affidavit, Quezada’s estranged wife provided a video to police on Jan. 15 that appeared to show Quezada walking into an alley behind the victim’s residence with a gas can, only to run out of the alley two minutes later with the same gas can.
The affidavit states that Quezada sent a video to his estranged wife at 11:20 a.m. on the day of the fire, wearing the same clothes the person holding the gas can was seen wearing.
The woman identified her estranged husband as the man in the video behind the alley.
Police said Quezada went to the Arson Office voluntarily on Thursday afternoon and admitted to starting the fire by pouring gasoline on a wooden fence behind the structure and igniting it.
Quezada was arrested Thursday on first-degree felony arson charges. His bond was set at $45,000, court records show.
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