Police arrested a St. Thomas teenager Thursday and charged him with setting his house on fire and locking his mother and two young sisters inside to die five years ago.
Alexander David, 17, a recent Charlotte Amalie High School graduate, was 12 years old on Aug. 12, 1995, when police say he committed murder and arson.
Although the police did not identify David on Thursday, his name appeared in press accounts at the time of the incident, saying he escaped from the burning house in Fredenhoj by jumping from a porch and was not found until hours after the fire was started.
Territorial Police Chief Jose Garcia said Thursday that arson and murder had been suspected from the beginning because "the doors were locked."
Garcia would not say, however, why David had been picked up now, five years later.
"There's no statute of limitations on murder," he said. "We don't close our books. As soon as you get the information you need and you have probable cause, you make the arrest."
"It may be that somebody gave you information," he added.
Kathleen Osuji, who was 44 at the time, and her two youngest children, 2-year-old Briane and 4-year-old Kaitlin, perished in the fire.
David, who was picked up Thursday at a residence in Hospital Ground, had planned to enroll in a Wisconsin university this fall where he wanted to major in drama, according to a former teacher and another friend.
He had been active in the Reichhold Repertory Youth Theater group at the University of the Virgin Islands two years ago and had been voted Mr. Charlotte Amalie High School in his junior year.
The family is well known in the community. David’s older twin brothers, Ivan and Isiah Sullivan, are now in New York City pursuing modeling careers; they were not home at the time of the fire. A sister, Rina David, was living with her father, former police officer Ivan David, from whom Osuji was divorced. Osuji's oldest child, Ruth Ann David, was a track star when she attended CAHS; she had her own apartment near her mother's home.
David is being held in lieu of $300,000 bail. He is to appear Friday at an advice-of-rights hearing in Territorial Court. It was unclear where he was being held Thursday night. Corrections Bureau officials said they do not hold minors. A woman answering the telephone at the Youth Rehabilitation Center on St. Croix late Thursday night said she was not allowed to give out information about minors being held at the center.