Man of the same name, age and town as wildfire arson suspect faces online harassment

LOVELAND, Colo — Jason “Jay” Hobby said he’s called Loveland home for more than 20 years. In that time, he has dedicated himself to helping people with disabilities, even giving some of them a place to stay in his home.

In a single instant, all the good he’s done for his community was unraveled by a man with the same name and age, also from Loveland.

“I mean, it’s got to be like a billion to one,” Hobby said.

Last week, the Larimer County Sheriff’s Office arrested the “other” Jason Hobby and charged him for starting the Alexander Mountain Fire. The fire burned nearly 10,000 acres west of Loveland.

“Of course, I watched the press conference last Wednesday, and the minute they said his name, and they said, ‘Jason Alexander Hobby,’ I immediately go, ‘Oh no,'” Jay said. “I knew instantly, like, I have got to pay attention to the internet today.”

As suspected, he opened social media to find comments improperly tagging him and connecting him to alleged crimes.

“People started doxing me, putting out my address, my phone number, place of work,” he said. “All this information I don’t want to have on the internet. I immediately started taking action. You know, I’d go to the administrators of the pages, I’d also directly respond, to what people were saying, you know, you got the wrong person.”

He said he believes harm was minimized by jumping on the issue early and receiving support from his friends and other community members. Still, Loveland Police said it increased patrols around his home, just in case.

“I was scared for my family and the people I care for,” Hobby said. “You know, I was afraid because my address had been put out, my home information had been put out, and people would start showing up.”

In addition to the tarnishing of his reputation that came from sharing a name with the arson suspect, he said his property was burned in the Alexander Mountain Fire.

“We have property up on Storm Mountain which, literally, I had neighbors burnt to the ground,” Hobby said. “We had trees burned on the property. It’s insane. So, it literally came to our back door, and then he stole my name.”

Luckily, Hobby’s mountain cabin was spared from the flames and nothing serious came from the doxing. 

Despite all, he said he appreciates the community support he saw while he dealt with the “worst coincidence” of his life.

“It’s beautiful on that level that something that started so scary and so incredibly toxic became something so beautiful because of the amount of support that rallied around us and the community here and on the mountain and come to find has blown out a little bit further than that,” he said, with a laugh.

Still, he said he hopes his story will be a reminder of how misinformation can have damaging effects.

“People need to take the time to take a step back,” Jay said. “And when you get information, collect all the information. You want to be an armchair warrior? Take your time, collect all the information. And don’t dox anybody. Don’t dox the other Jason Hobby either. That’s not fair to him or his family either. People don’t deserve to have their lives ruined because of a similar name or some kind of confusion created because of our information systems.”