Prosecutors said David Crawford targeted people he believed had wronged him, including relatives and former colleagues, in fires that stretched across Maryland for nearly a decade.
CLARKSBURG, Md. — A former Maryland police chief was sentenced in February to 55 years in prison after pleading guilty to arson charges tied to fires at his stepson’s home, adding another major sentence to the multiple life terms he already received in a wider revenge-driven serial arson case.
David Michael Crawford, 74, was sentenced in Montgomery County after admitting he set three fires in Clarksburg in 2016, 2017 and 2020. The case mattered beyond one family because prosecutors said it fit a broader pattern that linked Crawford to 13 arsons in several Maryland counties between 2011 and 2020. Officials said he targeted people he believed had slighted him, from relatives to former public officials and law enforcement figures, and used methods investigators later described as strikingly consistent from scene to scene.
Crawford’s latest sentence followed years of investigation and earlier convictions in Howard County, where a jury in 2023 found him guilty of attempted murder, arson and malicious burning in several fires that forced sleeping families to run from their homes before dawn. Montgomery County prosecutors said the Clarksburg fires were set at the home of Crawford’s stepson, Justin Scherstrom, over a period of four years. At a news conference after the sentencing, Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy said the attacks grew out of grudges Crawford held against people he believed had crossed him. McCarthy said the pattern was blunt: people who fired him, argued with him or otherwise upset him could become targets. For Scherstrom, the case turned a long personal relationship into something much darker. He said the destruction and the years of uncertainty took a deep toll on his family.
Authorities have said the broader case began to come together after investigators from different counties started comparing notes on a series of suspicious fires with similar traits. In some incidents, surveillance video showed a hooded person approaching properties in the early morning hours and using gasoline to start the fires. Officials later said searches and records helped tie Crawford to victims with whom he had prior disputes. In Howard County, investigators said a January 2021 search of Crawford’s residence turned up evidence that included a written list of targets, people who later were identified as victims in the fire cases. Prosecutors also said the videos revealed a repeated method, gasoline used as an accelerant and a similar appearance from one scene to the next. That consistency became a key thread in connecting separate fires that had once looked like isolated crimes spread over different jurisdictions.
The known timeline stretched back to 2011, when prosecutors said Crawford set a fire in Prince George’s County and was captured on surveillance footage torching an unoccupied vehicle before accidentally setting himself on fire and running away. The accusations later expanded to fires in Howard, Montgomery, Frederick, Charles and Anne Arundel counties, though news reports in the Montgomery County sentencing described 13 fires in five counties and earlier official releases described 12 arsons in six counties. What officials have consistently said is that the victims were not random. They included a former Laurel official, former law enforcement officials, relatives, former medical providers and a person who lived in Crawford’s neighborhood. In several of the house fires, residents were asleep inside when flames broke out. No one was killed, but prosecutors said adults and children had to flee in the middle of the night and many lost personal belongings and any sense of safety in their homes.
Crawford’s public career added to the shock around the case. He served as police chief in Laurel from 2006 until his resignation in 2010. Before that, officials said, he had served as chief of the District Heights Police Department and as a major in the Prince George’s County Police Department. That background gave the case unusual weight for investigators and prosecutors, who openly noted the breach of public trust. Lt. Chris Moe of Montgomery County Fire and Rescue said it was disappointing to see someone from the same profession accused and convicted in such crimes. Howard County Fire Chief William Anuszewski said the allegations were disturbing because of the seriousness of the fires and the high public trust Crawford had once held. Prosecutors used that same point at sentencing, arguing that a man who had spent years in law enforcement had turned his knowledge and persistence toward frightening, deliberate attacks on private homes and property.
The Howard County case produced the heaviest punishment first. In June 2023, a judge sentenced Crawford to eight life terms plus 75 years after a jury convicted him on eight counts of attempted first-degree murder, three counts of first-degree arson and one count of first-degree malicious burning. Because some counts ran at the same time, prosecutors said the executable term there was two life sentences plus 75 years. The later Montgomery County plea dealt with three fires at the Clarksburg home connected to his stepson. News coverage of the plea said Crawford faced a maximum of 80 years in that case, but the 55-year sentence was set to run alongside the prison time he was already serving. McCarthy said his office still wanted the guilty plea and sentence on the Montgomery County charges in place in case the Howard County convictions were ever narrowed or overturned on appeal. That procedural step gave prosecutors another layer of certainty in a case built across many years and many counties.
For the people who lived through the fires, the legal milestones came long after the fear. Scherstrom told reporters that he had not initially seen his stepfather as a suspect because the family had weathered years of ordinary conflict and what he viewed at the time as routine bickering. Once investigators began focusing on Crawford, he said, the realization was devastating. At least one victim family in Howard County had been sleeping when a garage fire broke out. Another home fire sent adults and children scrambling outside before dawn. Prosecutors said arson causes damage far beyond walls and possessions because it destroys peace of mind. Richard Gibson, the Howard County state’s attorney, said after the 2023 sentencing that the impact of arson is complete in the way it invades victims’ sense of security. By the time Crawford was sentenced again in Montgomery County, victims and investigators alike described the outcome less as a single closing chapter than as a final public accounting for years of fear, loss and unanswered questions.
The case now stands with Crawford serving the Montgomery County sentence together with the earlier Howard County punishment, and the latest sentencing leaves him expected to remain in prison for the rest of his life. The next major milestone would come only if appellate courts revisit the Howard County convictions or if any remaining related matters in other counties move forward.