LEICESTER – Arson investigators have ruled a fire at a house owned by double-murder suspect Robert Jason Owens only days after his arrest as suspicious but are releasing few other details about the case.
Buncombe County deputy fire marshal Terry Gentry said Monday he could not release information about whether investigators had determined a cause of the blaze, which destroyed an unoccupied double-wide mobile home on Owens Cove Road on Friday. The old home, about 50 yards from Owens' primary residence, was no longer being used as living quarters.
"It is suspicious by nature based on the totality of the circumstances in that neighborhood," Gentry said.
Owens has been in custody since March 16 on murder charges in the deaths of Joseph "J.T." Codd and his wife, Cristie Codd.
Firefighters responded to the house fire early Friday, four days after Owens' arrest on the murder charges.
Search warrants released at a press conference held by Sheriff Van Duncan on Friday afternoon, only hours after the fire, revealed Owens admitted that he "stored and destroyed" the bodies of two victims.
The warrants also show the remains were at Owens' property on Owens Cove Road, part of them inside a woodstove.
Sheriff Van Duncan declined to comment on whether the woodstove was inside the burned home or whether other evidence might have been lost.
He said again Monday he couldn't comment on whether the fire and the murder investigation are connected. The investigation is still evolving and ongoing, he said.
Investigators have not released a possible motive in the murder case. Owens, a contractor, had done some work on the Codds'.
The house fire remains under investigation by the Buncombe County fire marshal's office, Asheville-Buncombe Arson Task Force and sheriff's office.
Because of the involvement of different agencies, Gentry said investigators are being deliberate in deciding what information to release.
"We do not want one investigation to have an adverse effect on another investigation," Gentry said.
