Inset: John Henry Walston Jr. (Escambia County Sheriff's Office). Background: The mobile home in Escambia County, Fla., where John Henry Walston Jr. allegedly killed two children before setting it on fire (WEAR/YouTube).
A Florida man is accused of killing two children, ages 9 and 7, before intentionally setting a mobile home they were in ablaze. Witnesses say the kids' mother ran into the trailer while it was on fire to try to save them, to no avail.
"She went into the trailer trying to get them. That's a mother's love," neighbor John Wenzel told local CBS affiliate WEAR. "She went inside the house trying to get her kids, but [it was] too hot."
Police say John Henry Walston Jr., 27, sexually assaulted one of the two children — 9-year-old Vayden Orum and 7-year-old Rayden Smith — inside his trailer at the Grand Oak Mobile Home Park in Escambia County and then murdered them both.
Walston allegedly set the residence on fire early Friday morning after the killings and fled. The mother who tried to rescue the children survived and was rushed to a local hospital with burn wounds. Walston was also treated at the hospital for injuries before cops arrested him.
"These children were not killed because of the fire," said Escambia County Sheriff Chip Simmons in a video posted on his office's Facebook page. "[Walston] assaulted one, then killed them both before saving himself."
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Walston reportedly lives at the mobile home with his own family, including two children. Tyler Smith, the father of Rayden Smith and stepfather of Vayden Orum, told WEAR that he has "known him for a couple of years" and that the victims also lived in the mobile home park.
Smith said his kids were allegedly staying over at Walston's trailer with his own children during the incident.
"How can you expect any human being to do this?" Smith told WEAR. "John, I hope they give you hell in prison, because you better be glad they found you before I did."
Walston has been charged with two counts of premeditated murder, one count of sexual assault on a victim under 12, and one count of arson. His first court date has been set for Nov. 26 and he's being held until then without bond.
"I don't know what else I can say about this terrible event except for please hug your children," Simmons, the sheriff, concluded in his Facebook video.
The victims' grandmother, Lisa Pinegar, described their deaths as a "bad dream" while speaking to WEAR over the weekend. "A real bad dream," she said, recalling how the kids had a sibling who talked to her over the phone about what happened.
"He said, 'Mommy has been life flighted to the hospital. My brother and sister is no longer here, they're dead,'" Pinegar recounted. "He just kept telling me over and over and I didn't believe it. I didn't want to believe it."
