ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with four main issues. First, a brief historical background to the topic, second, a short exposition of the law in the UK, third, an outline of the size of the problem, and fourth, a discussion of some issues of classification and management. In England and Wales, arson is the legal term used to describe acts of unlawful fire raising. In other jurisdictions (notably the North Americas) the preferred terms are fire raising, fire setting, incendiarism and, in certain cases, pyromania and pathological fire setting. (For a review of the last, see Barnett and Spitzer 1994.) Whatever term we use to describe the unlawful use of fire, we should acknowledge at the outset that it constitutes a very serious form of crime. Not only is it regarded as a very serious form of offending behaviour because the harm caused to persons and property may be very considerable, but it is also an offence that can be committed at "one remove" and may involve many victims, some of them unintended. It is also a very difficult crime to detect, although recent advances in forensic science have greatly improved methods of detection (see Arson Prevention Bureau 2003; Home Office n.d.).1 As we shall see, the motivations of arsonists are complex and courts are inclined to call for psychiatric reports in all but the most apparently straightforward of cases. I emphasize the word apparently because even what appear to be the clearest of motives (such as setting a fire in order to claim insurance compensation for a failing business) may be associated with an underlying psychiatric problem (see Prins 2000, 2001). However, Soothill has wisely suggested caution in seeking psychiatric explanations in cases where the behaviour is merely baffling, since this tends to "medicalize" socially problematic behaviour - a matter that was referred to in Chapter 3 of this book (see Soothill 1991).
