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Suspicious fire ruins 2 businesses Photo by Bob Pennell Investigators explore a Clark Street building Thursday after two shops were gutted by fire. Pro Interiors owner Mitch Pronobsis lost two valuable cars -- this Mercedes and a rare Corvette. Investigators say the blaze almost surely was arson. Arson, vandalism strike area By CHRIS BRISTOL For the past four years, Mitch Pronobsis painstakingly slaved to restore a 1977 Chevrolet Corvette he bought from a pal for $7,000. By the time he finished, Pronobsis figures, he spent more than $24,000 on the sleek, candy apple red roadster -- only to see it destroyed in a white-hot three-alarm fire early Thursday at his shop in west Medford. "Man, I wanted to cry," he said. "All that nickel-and-diming really added up. I mean, it was cherry." By no means was the Vette the only casualty. The blaze gutted two businesses -- Accurate Audio and Pronobsis' Pro Interiors -- and a 1974 Mercedes 450SL that Pronobsis was also storing at the shop. At the scene Thursday, fire investigator Dan Patterson described the blaze as suspicious and said a firebug was almost certainly to blame. A damage estimate wasn't available. In addition to the fire at 1 and 7 W. Clark St., somebody tried to torch a motorcycle and a trash can a couple of blocks away. The events began to unfold right after a truck was vandalized nearby. "We had four incidents almost exactly at the same time in the same basic area last night," he said. "It's kind of a stretch, this being all a coincidence." Patterson gave this account: Shortly before midnight, Medford police responded to reports of breaking glass in the area and discovered a bashed-out headlight on a parked dump truck at Jackson and Holly streets. Officers then spotted a motorcycle on fire one block over on Welch Street. They radioed for help, and a fire engine rolled to the scene. Firefighters quickly doused the blaze with an extinguisher. Only the seat of the motorcycle had burned. On the way back to the station, a firefighter spotted smoke and flames coming from the building at Clark and Cedar streets. The time was 12:02 a.m., only a few minutes after the first call. "One of our guys said, `Holy cow, look! There's a structure on fire,"' Patterson recounted. "They called it in and started the attack." This time, more than an extinguisher was necessary. All five Medford fire trucks were called out, as well as an off-duty shift of firefighters. Pumper trucks from Jacksonville, Phoenix and Central Point assisted. Patterson said firefighters were hampered by heavy smoke and exposed power lines. At one point, crews were ordered out of the building when the ceiling collapsed. No injuries were reported. Only later did Patterson discover a tipped over and burned-out garbage can near the motorcycle on Welch. "It looks like they went right down the street," he said. "The trash can probably happened somewhere in between." He added that it was possible the fires were discovered in reverse order. Investigators will reconstruct the sequence of events. The neighborhood where the fire occurred has had many problems with transients in recent years, Patterson noted. Three years ago, a man was stabbed to death in a drunken fight with two other men -- right in front of Accurate Audio. Patterson said the fires looked to him like random acts. "It's not like they had something in for these guys," he said. "They were just dinkin' around. It could have been any alley." Unfortunately for Pronobsis, it was his alley. Along with his cars, Pronobsis also lost much of his livelihood. Doing business as Pro Interiors, he mainly makes magazine and book racks for grocery stores and retailers. The fire destroyed about 200 masonite templates Pronobsis needed to fabricate decorative end-pieces. He was unsure if insurance would cover anything but his tools. "I don't know that much about insurance," he said. "I guess I'm gonna learn now." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA