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SAN DIEGO – Arson investigators say two early-morning apartment fires in the Mid-City area may have been started by the same person.

The two blazes began about 30 minutes apart at two apartment complexes within blocks of each other.

The fire was reported at 4 a.m. in Normal Heights in the 4000 block of Hawley Boulevard. A woman trapped on the second floor of that apartment building called for help through the window. Firefighters used a ladder to rescue her.

She is now hospitalized, but firefighters described her injuries as non-lifethreatening.

Just as roughly 30 firefighters knocked down the Hawley Boulevard fire , they had to turn their sirens back on and head several blocks west to Kansas Street in North Park. There they found a first-floor fire that had spread to the second floor in an apartment located in the 4600 block of Kansas Street.

A man who had been inside when the fire started, He and his neighbor made it out safely.

San Diego fire investigators say they believe the two fires as arson, They have a suspect in mind, but requested that FOX 5 not release his name, since this is an open investigation.

Witness Robin Truex said she is best friends with the woman who is now hospitalized and acts as caregiver for the man displaced by the second fire.

“I assumed that it was electrical, because I just couldn’t imagine anybody would do something like that, come to find out my best friend…he set her place on fire too. She almost died. She’s in the hospital right now,” Truex said through tears.

Truex told Fox 5 she believes she and her friend named Shauna are being targeted by her son’s best friend.

“She said her place was set on fire. He set her living room on fire, he shoved her in the bedroom and set her house on fire,” said Robin.

Robin also said she and Shauna had been trying to help the young man. She didn’t know why he turned on them.

“Because he seemed to be a nice guy and kind of down on his luck, I just never dreamed he would do something like this ever. I just couldn’t imagine anyone doing something like that.”

Firefighters said between the two fires, damage is estimated at $500,000.