There was a statement posted on Wayne Houchin's facebook stream. I'll just quote it for those who are not on his list.

"WAYNE HOUCHIN SEVERELY BURNED IN THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC.

A statement from Wayne:

Monday while appearing on a TV show in the Dominican Republic, the TV host took a handful of Aqua De Florida, ignited it and intentionally dropped it on my head, setting me on fire.

I was not aware he was going to do this. This was not a stunt or part of an act - this was a criminal attack.

The fast actions of the rest of our Curiosidades team saved my life. The fire was put out and I was rushed to the emergency room. I have bad burns on my head, face, neck and right hand.

I am in pain, but am recovering. I will update you on the situation when I can."

So keep him and his family in your thoughts.

Holy crap! That's terrible.

How horrific! ...Prayers being said for him.

Copied from elsewhere:

[Felix Bodden] So every year since 2010 the crew of Curiosidades Show comes to my country (Dominican Republic) searching to expand the art of magic this time in one of their presentations on TV Wayne Houchin was attacked by the host (Franklin Barazarte) with Florida water a very flamable liquid here are some photos: (attached)

The reason of why he did this nobody knows but another host from another program said that there's nothing wrong with this action they deserve it because the crew of Curiosidades is doing voodoo and witchcraft...

You guys can't really imagine how embarrassed I am.

Sorry about my english.

[magics] From what I believe, Aqua de florida is a liquid used by practitioners to cleanse spirits and ward off evil. Please correct me if Im wrong. So i guess the host believed that WH was using some sort of black magic etc.

[Felix Bodden] Exactly, they though the crew was doing black magic or something like that, that's the problem when you are a really good magician..

This news deeply saddens me. I feel for Wayne and his family at this time and wish him a very speedy recovery.
I also hope he pursues some kind of legal action against this crime and justice is served.
It's such a shame in this day and age that such acts of horrific violence are still carried out in the name of superstition and uninformed nonsense. An important reminder on the necessity of education.
The fact that it has happened to such a creative and generous member of our magic community is very unsettling.
For those who want to follow his progress: https://twitter.com/WayneHouchin

A video of the attack has just been posted, so you can see exactly what happened.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pl ... QOeFC0d12k

That sucks. Tough to tell if it real or a stunt, really hard to tell these days. How did the other guy put his hands through the "fire" so easily and not get burnt? Almost looked like a WWE or publicity stunt. Why did Wayne just stand there when he moved forward? Natural instinct would usually make one back up not stand still. Just tough to tell if it is real or not. I don't believe 95% of the stuff I see on the internet.

Wayne stood there cause he agreed to be a part of a of a ritual which he did not realize meant to be burnt alive.

Kinda looked like a stunt maybe gone wrong. Tough to tell as a lot of info is missing. OK I just read Wayne's posts on the Cafe that explains it. But I am still slightly skeptical but it is possible it was all legit. I guess there will be a lot of skeptics considering magicians lie so much and do so many publicity stunts so you never know what to believe.

But then again everything you see on the internet is true. In fact I read that on the internet.

I really doubt this was a publicity stunt gone wrong. It appears to be as was stated in all of Wayne's posts. It looks intentional. No one can speculate what the TV hosts intentions were but all that changes is the degree of criminal intent. That is all chalked up to what lawyers call a mitigating circumstance. Reasons do not exonerate guilt, they just vary the penalty.

I have never been standing next to someone who had flaming cologne thrown on his head before but I have been in many situations when things went to H@ll quickly and someone got hurt. (My old fire days) What I can say is that the reactions you see of everyone involved, Wayne, Fran, BJ, and who ever was filming, are pretty consistent with the way real people react when shocked. It is hard to act that out and if it was a publicity stunt you are watching four Oscar worthy performances. For someone who has never been in a situation like that I can see why their might be some suspicion. Movies give us the assumption that people will act differently than they really do in sudden life threatening situations. This was no publicity stunt.

It is tough to tell by the video alone, and why is it that that one part was the only part shown? Or did the camera just start recording at the right time? It looked as though the guy was trying to rub it down to Wayne's face, or was trying to put it out as he did not expect to get that out of control, probably more so the former but who knows? Also why would everyone just stand there, especially Wayne's group, and not jump the guy and beat the crap out of him? I know I would have burnt or not.

Well the standing there bit....that is pretty consistent with what I have seen and experienced is situations like that. You mind first is processing what is happening, then the immediate concern is helping your friend, and by the time the "a$$ kicking" neurons start to fire it is too late to do so in a defensive way because the guy has stopped being a threat. So all you have left is revenge and that is a hard one to predict. Three days after the fact people really don't know why he did it so at the time it would have been even harder.

There is a great book called "Deep Survival" that talks a lot about what happens to the mind in emergency situations. It explains a lot of the reaction you see in that footage. I recall an interesting anecdote of an F-15 pilot involved in a mid air collision in Alaska. The plane is in the process of breaking up and the pilot has the presence of mind to clearly call out "Eject" three times before he does so. By doing this the air controllers were able to accurately pinpoint his position the moment he ejected from the plane. This in turn helped facilitate his rescue. So the book talks a lot about how flight training prepares these guys to keep a cool head even when their plane is disintegrating. Anyways I digress. The point is that it is safe to say that Wayne, his wife Fran, and BJ have never trained for an attack like that and thus they need to process what the edited is happening first before they do. Even the one being attacked, Wayne, hesitates for a second or two before getting away from the guy. That is to be expected.

So it is a super interesting book and worth the read if you are interested in understanding some of what you saw. Here is a link to it on amazon. http://www.amazon.com/Deep-Survival-Who ... gy_b_img_y

As for some of your other points, I agree that until we hear that guys side of the situation it is kind of hard to tell if he is maliciously trying to spread the fire or if, in a panic after realizing that whatever he was up to went horribly wrong, he is trying to put the flames out. That is for the courts to figure out. Wayne had mentioned that eventually the entire footage will be released as it was being filmed by the TV crews as well. Of course there is also a chance that the TV station will do what it can to suppress the footage they have for legal reasons. We will just have to wait and see on that?

Well, there is no reason for Wayne to lie. If it was a stunt went wrong he would say it. The explanation of what happened that was officially released by Wayne and others that were there clarified the situation. Plus I been following a lot of updates from Daniel Garcia on his Facebook page. Its sad to see that happen because Wayne is a really great guy and I got to see him live at a lecture in NY. Hopefully he'll be back on his feet in no time doing what he does best.

Another thing that strikes me as odd is that Wayne has insurance yet a funding has been set up, and it seems like every time something happens to a magician we are expected to "pay" for it. Shouldn't the moron who did it be paying for it all? A lot of scams go on so I don't believe everything I see on the internet. I was not there so I do not know all the facts. But a lot does not add up. I am surprised also that Wayne was able to post updates but did not take a pic in the hospital like many do.

Insurance doesn't always get a check to you right away. If Wayne was living hand-to-mouth and doesn't have any savings then he may need some cash to cover day-to-day/month-to-month expenses.