Texas woman accused of setting boyfriend on fire during fight at gas station

During a fight with her boyfriend at a Texas gas station, a woman poured gasoline on her boyfriend and set him on fire, “melting” his skin off, police reported. 

Ricky Doyle and his girlfriend Breana Johnson were arguing at a Shell gas station in Arlington, Texas, on July 18. 

“I’m going to kill you,” Johnson, 24, told Doyle, 25, according to a police affidavit. 

Surveillance footage shows Johnson going inside the gas station and paying for $0.50 worth of gasoline. When she came out of the gas station, she grabbed the gas nozzle and poured gasoline all over Doyle, who was in the back seat of a Jeep. 

She then walked around to the driver’s seat and set him on fire. Doyle was consumed by the flames almost immediately. The footage shows how he leaves the car and is seen running through the parking, attempting to put out the fire. 

“Several witnesses then observed the victim quickly exit the vehicle and was completely engulfed in flames,” the court document says. “The victim ran throughout the parking lot attempting to extinguish the flames before another witness used a fire extinguisher on him. The victim walked into the gas station, where multiple witnesses attempted to render aid to the victim, who was bleeding and had skin that appeared to have melted from his body.”

As Doyle was burning up, Johnson told bystanders that she was smoking while pumping gas, which caused the fire. 

Some of the witnesses did not believe her story, and one even tried to detain her to prevent her from leaving before the police got there. However, she pushed him away and “drove away while smiling,” reported The New York Post. 

After hanging on to life for two weeks, the victim died on Tuesday in a Dallas-area hospital from the wounds inflicted by the burns on August 2, according to the Arlington Police Department. 

Johnson was arrested in July and was charged with aggravated assault-bodily injury with a deadly weapon. She will also be charged with murder, following Doyle’s death. She is being held on a $50,000 bond and is slated to appear in court on August 10.