On the morning of March 6, 2015, 17-year-old Jacob Matthew Morgan was watching his baby half-brother Joshua in their Rock Hill mobile home. By 8:30 a.m., the home was engulfed in flames, and Joshua didn’t survive. Within days, police arrested Jacob, charging him with murder and first-degree arson.
According to The Herald, neighbors described Jacob running for help, shouting that his brother was still inside. Some recalled him collapsing outside the burning home, distraught and hitting his head on the ground. They said Jacob claimed he tried to reach the baby but was driven back by the heat.
Investigators, however, found the fire had started in two separate places. Jacob’s story shifted as well – first saying smoke woke him, then later admitting he never went back inside. He also failed to call 911, choosing instead to watch the fire before eventually seeking help from a neighbour.
The evidence painted a very different picture
Jacob eventually told police he’d been playing with tea candles that morning and admitted he’d started a small fire in his bedroom weeks earlier. He said he dropped a candle on the baby’s blanket and set a string on a pillow alight in the living room.
Investigators believed he tried to make it look like space heaters caused the blaze, and prosecutors argued he understood exactly what he was doing, noting he watched the fire instead of calling for help. Despite this, Jacob’s family stood by him, insisting he loved Joshua deeply and would never have harmed him on purpose.
Jacob’s step-dad, Myke Hill, told people after court, “The kid called his mom at work, crying because one of the newborn kittens was sick and he thought it was dying. I’m not gonna have any sheriff, any investigator tell me to my face that he’s a cold-blooded killer when he cries at Disney movies.” Just like cases where strange situations end in murder convictions, this story makes people think hard about who should be held responsible and how.
Things changed when Jacob went to court in November 2016. Instead of going to trial for murder, he agreed to plead guilty to involuntary manslaughter and unlawful conduct toward a child. For the arson charge, he did something called an Alford plea, which means he didn’t say he was guilty but agreed to take the punishment anyway.
Judge Dan Hall gave him 15 years in prison. Jacob cried during the hearing and told the judge how much he loved Joshua. “He was my best friend,” Jacob said. “To kill him would be killing a piece of myself. He was the only brother I ever had. I just wish I could have gotten to him in time.”
The parole board said no to letting Jacob out early two times, once in 2021 and again in 2022. But in December 2022, after spending about seven years locked up, which was around half his sentence, he got out. Now he has to stay on probation for five years. In other sad situations involving manslaughter convictions, the questions about what’s right and wrong don’t have easy answers.
Published: Dec 25, 2025 01:34 pm