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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- A 58-year-old woman has died after dousing herself in gasoline at a convenience store and then setting herself on fire, Salt Lake City police said.
Ann Ellen McLain used a credit card to activate a gas pump at a convenience store on Sunday night, soaked herself in gasoline and then walked behind a trash bin behind the store where she set herself on fire, police said.
A man walking into the store saw the flames and told the store clerk to call 911, and then tried to put the fire out by pouring buckets of water on McLain, police Detective Dwayne Baird said Monday.
"He went out and tried to douse her, but water on a body soaked with gasoline doesn't work real well," Baird said.
Fire crews eventually put the fire out, and McLain was pronounced dead at the scene, Baird said.
McLain lived in the Salt Lake Valley, but an exact address isn't known, Baird said. He said family members told authorities the woman had a history of mental problems.
Nobody else was hurt, and neither the trash bin nor the convenience store sustained damage, Baird said.
(Copyright 2005 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
