Authorities say a Rockwell man tried to set fire to a padded county jail cell after they put him there to sober up.

The Rowan County Sheriff’s Office charged Myron Gilbert Jones, 56, of the 12000 block of Old Beatty Ford Road, with first-degree arson.

Jones had been brought into the Rowan County Detention Center for a “drunk assist,” which means he was intoxicated, but would be released once he was sober enough to take care of himself. Jones was placed in a padded cell.

He had hidden some matches in one of his socks and used them to start a fire in the padded cell. The fire was immediately extinguished by jail staff and there was minimal damage, a statement said.

Jones remains in the Rowan County Detention Center under at $20,000 secured bond. Jones has a lengthy criminal record dating to a 1987 conviction for misdemeanor traffic infractions of driving while impaired. He has also been convicted of misdemeanor assault with a deadly weapon, misdemeanor breaking and entering, habitually driving while impaired, driving while license permanently revoked, assault on a female and domestic criminal trespass.