Mary Wolf was watching TV inside her Hallandale Beach mobile home Monday afternoon when she heard shouting.
Wolf looked out her front window and saw three teenagers beating another teen with towels. Wolf, who heard one of the teens scream he was burning, walked out of her trailer across the street.
Only when Wolf, 82, looked up did she see her neighbor's trailer on fire and realize the boy was burned in the blaze.
Hallandale Beach police spokesman Andrew Casper said firefighters arrived to find a 17-year-old with second-degree burns from ''head to toe.'' Fire Marshal Miguel Aleman added that 80 percent of the boy's body was burned.
Police had not released the teen's name Monday night, saying they had not spoken with his family.
Fire inspectors were still investigating what sparked the blaze, but Aleman said a gasoline can was being stored in the house. ''There was no cap on it, so it was not properly secured,'' he said. ''You don't store gasoline in the house.''
Fire inspectors said they learned the boy may have kept the gasoline in his house after he filled up his lawn mower, Aleman said.
Monday night, the boy was alive, but was fighting serious injuries. ''He's still hanging on to a thread,'' Casper said.
Wolf's 911 call about 1:45 p.m. set off a flurry of action in the Sunnydale mobile home park, 915 SW Fifth St. More than 20 Hallandale Beach firefighters arrived and in 10 minutes contained the blaze. But the home that neighbors said belonged to Maria Deen and her son, Cesar, is gone.
All that remained on Monday evening was a charred wood frame and a roof that had melted inward at the center.
Wolf's concrete stoop outside her Bedford Avenue trailer became the area where she hovered over the writhing boy, calling 911 and his mother, she recalled Monday night, still shaken from the day's events. The other teens fled after leaving the burned boy with her.
While Wolf called 911, another neighbor Joe Medlin, 44, helped the teenager on the pavement.
''I was trying to keep him calm so he wouldn't move,'' said Medlin, who himself was once burned.
'I just kept talking to him and telling him that it's going to be all right. He asked if he was going to die and I told him, 'No, you'll be all right.' ''
Wolf said she didn't know the teen well, but said he was kind enough to mow her lawn regularly and was always polite.
His mother was also described as friendly.
''I hope he gets well and I hope he is able to move around again because . . . it was really bad,'' Wolf said. ''He is just a young boy and was the nicest one in here.''
Distributed by the Associated Press
