ORANGE COUNTY, Fla. – A Winter Garden man faces charges after deputies said he beat a woman and set a car on fire, according to an arrest affidavit.
Deputies said they responded to a home on Gaymar Drive on March 28 around 7:35 p.m. in reference to a vehicle fire.
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According to the affidavit, deputies found a Ford Mustang “fully engulfed in flames” in the southeast corner of the lot.
Deputies said upon making contact with the occupants of the residence, a man asked them to help his mother, who the man said was injured. The woman was holding the back of her head and bleeding profusely, according to the affidavit.
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Deputies said the woman was transported to the hospital where she said in a statement that she allowed a local transient – later identified as Eulices Cardona – to sleep on her couch because “she felt bad that he had no home.”
The woman told deputies that earlier in the evening, she was in the kitchen when she observed Cardona intoxicated in the backyard where he started a fire.
She then saw Cardona throw a propane tank into the fire, according to the affidavit. The woman told deputies she ran outside to try to remove the tank from the fire. While she bent over to pick up the tank, deputies said Cardona struck her “two to three times in the back of the head with an unknown object.”
The victim said she began to scream for help and then walked to the front yard where she saw the vehicle on fire, deputies said.
She told deputies that Cardona was not there anymore and she was unsure where he went.
Detectives investigating the fire determined there was probable cause that Cardona committed arson.
The victim was later able to identify Cardona from a photo lineup.
According tot he affidavit, an arrest warrant was issued for Cardona for aggravated battery with great bodily harm and second degree arson to a vehicle or vessel. He was arrested on Friday by Winter Garden police.