KENT, Ohio -- Is that any way to treat a hero?

A 19-year-old Kent man wants to know why he was tasered by police and arrested outside his burning home after he risked injury by getting seven people to safety early Sunday morning.

"I was panicked, I was excited, my house was burning down," said Micheal Bartlett Jr., of the 600 block of Crain Avenue. "They were just standing there and one of them cursed at me. Then they threw me to the ground, put a knee to my head and tasered me. I did nothing wrong."

Kent Police Chief Jim Peach said it happened differently.

"It was 4:30 in the morning, our officers just got there," he said. "The occupants of the house were very intoxicated. One kept yelling to the police to go into the burning building and get his personal belongings. The police refused. The man started chest-butting the officers. The police tried to give him space, but he would not stop. So they tasered him to get him under control and placed him under arrest for misconduct at an emergency."

Bartlett denied chest-butting the officers.

"I have witnesses who saw the whole thing," he said. "The police officers were just standing there. I asked them to do something and one of them cursed at me."

Fire officials said the two-story house was destroyed in the fire, with damages at more than $90,000. The cause of the fire is under investigation.

Bartlett said he was in downtown Kent that morning and went home at 4:30 a.m. and saw flames in his sister's room.

"I was afraid my sister was in her room," Bartlett said. "The whole room was in flames. I ran in, but I could not breathe. I went to the basement because five of my friends were down there. I ran down and got them up and out of the house.

"Then, I went back in because I knew that two more friends were sleeping upstairs," he continued. "The smoke was so thick, I could not breathe. I reached them and got them out. We could hear the windows popping as we ran outside. It turned out my sister was at her boyfriend's house."

Bartlett's father, also named Micheal, said his son received second degree burns on his ears, head and back and was left in a jail cell until the next day.

"I could not believe that they didn't take him to the hospital," he said. "They made him go before a judge before they released him to me. I took him to Robinson Memorial Hospital in Ravenna.

"I just don't get it," Bartlett Sr. said. "My son saved seven people's lives and they taser him and arrest him. It does not make sense."