MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Police arrested a 46-year-old man on six attempted murder charges Wednesday after accusing him of setting a fire in a northwest Miami-Dade Walgreens earlier in the week.
According to an arrest report from the Miami-Dade Police Department, the fire happened just after 6 p.m. Monday at the store’s location at 9498 NW Seventh Ave. in the county’s Pinewood area.
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Police said Felix Hidalgo became “belligerent and aggressive” when he came to pick up a prescription he believed to be at the store, telling a pharmacy technician “stop playing with me and you have my prescription.”
According to the report, records revealed that Hidalgo’s prescription was actually at a store in Miami Beach.
After continuing to talk “aggressively” in Spanish, the pharmacy manager told Hidalgo he couldn’t speak to employees like that, but he continued, eventually telling staffers “this place is going to catch on fire” and he hoped “it blows up,” the report states.
After the pharmacy manager requested assistance in dealing with Hidalgo, the pharmacy technician walked back towards her and saw the store’s aisle nine “completely in flames,” police said. Store managers evacuated the building.
“While the fire was taking place, (the technician) stated she observed (Hidalgo) in the makeup aisle stealing items from the store,” police wrote in the report. “She stated to (Hidalgo) he needed to get out because there was a fire. (He) ran and grab(b)ed a blanket with items inside and fled.”
According to police, on Wednesday, business owners flagged down a Miami police officer near Northwest 29th Street and 17th Avenue, in the city’s Allapattah neighborhood, to let her know that a man, later identified as Hidalgo, was “picking up rocks and throwing them.”
Hidalgo already had an active warrant relating to a probation violation, police said. Court records show he has an extensive history of arrests in Miami-Dade County.
Police said Hidalgo would end up making additional threats in front of officers, including promising to a Miami officer that he would “set the airport on fire” after he left MDPD’s headquarters and telling the investigating MDPD officer several times that he was “going to shoot everyone.”
Authorities took Hidalgo, who is homeless, to the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center. In addition to the attempted murder charges, he faced charges of arson, criminal mischief and petit theft.
Jail records show he was being held without bond on the probation violation, which stemmed from an armed robbery charge.