Riverdale Police are looking for the person who firebombed a 22-year-old Clayton County schoolteacher’s home in Riverdale August 20, sending her to the hospital with severe burns.
Police say they responded about 2:39 a.m. to the home in the 300 block of Derby Drive, which was already “fully engulfed with flames and had smoke emitting out of the windows.” They found two women, one of whom, Adreana Swanson, had “visible bodily injury” to her face, neck, and both arms.
“Officers advised Clayton County Dispatch to have Riverdale Fire and Clayton County EMS to put a rush on it,” according to the report.
A neighbor told police he had been sitting in his garage “when he noticed an unidentified male carrying a grocery bag….moments later he saw the man running from behind his neighbors house and then [the man] began to walk when [the man] got in front of his residence….the male then began to run out of the neighborhood.”
Video from a nearby Nest camera shows a person running in the street just after two blasts and the roar of flames just off camera. The man runs into the frame, pivots, then jogs back as a woman shouts:
The teacher and her mother were transported to Grady Hospital, where she is in ICU.
RPD says the suspect is a Black male who was wearing a white shirt, black pants, and a Corona mask.
WSB’s Tom Jones spoke with a neighbor who ran to bring the burned woman a wet towel: “If she wasn’t fast to run out, she would have been dead.” Police are urging nearby neighbors to share their home security video so they can catch the person responsible.
If you have any information about this incident or know who the suspect might be, RPD says it “would be greatly appreciated” if you called CrimeStoppers at (404) 546-2016 or sent in a tip via www.StopCrimeATL.org .
