The man faces arson and murder charges in a fatal chase crash in Fountain Valley

A Huntington Beach man who allegedly set a fire outside a Fountain Valley apartment on Monday – sparking a police pursuit that ended in a fatal collision – was charged with suspicion of arson, murder and evading police taken to prison.

Timothy Bradford Cole, 43, was hospitalized with serious injuries after his Dodge Ram crashed into a white BMW as he fled from officers at Ellis Avenue and Magnolia Street Monday evening, Fountain Valley police reported Tuesday.

Three female occupants of the BMW were also transported to a nearby trauma center, but one of them – 25-year-old Hong Ngoc Nguyen, an exchange student from Vietnam – died of her injuries en route, according to an FVPD release Wednesday.

The vehicle’s other two occupants, described as women in their 20s, were released from the hospital Wednesday and are back at home in Huntington Beach recovering from serious injuries they suffered in the crash, the release said.

All three victims grew up in Vietnam and had been friends since middle school, police reported. However, it is unclear whether Nguyen was officially living in Huntington Beach at the time of her death.

Cole, who was being held at a holding facility Wednesday night, could face charges of murder, arson and evading a peace officer, resulting in the death of another person, according to an online jail inmate search administered by the sheriff’s department.

Police believe the suspect was involved in a domestic dispute shortly after 10 p.m. Monday when he allegedly doused a bush next to a residence in the 18000 block of Arches Court with lighter fluid and set it on fire before fleeing the scene , the police reported on Tuesday.

Officers found Cole’s truck in a parking lot in the 17900 block of Brookhurst Street in Fountain Valley and initiated a pursuit. The chase ended with the fatal collision at the intersection of Ellis and Magnolia.