Three-year jail sentence for torching wrong flat in attempt to take revenge on girlfriend's former-lover

Malaga's provincial court has sentenced a man to three years in prison for setting fire to a flat in an attempt to take revenge on an acquaintance with whom his girlfriend had been intimate. His plan did not work out as he had hoped, as he made a mistake and set fire to a neighbour's house.

According to the sentence, the incident happened one afternoon in September 2021. After convincing a friend and, surprisingly, his own partner to go along with his plan, they went to a petrol station to buy a container of fuel.

The three defendants went to the home of the victim, whom the main defendant had repeatedly been threatening to kill through phone calls and messages. Without caring about the risk of causing damage to other people's flats, the defendants set the container on fire and threw it into the flat.

However, according to the sentence, they got the wrong window and the bottle ended up inside the flat of their target's neighbour. The woman's property caught fire, threatening to quickly spread to other flats.

The damage caused to the woman's home amounted to 18,000 euros. What was more concerning was that the woman was injured and it took ten days for the wound on her right inner thigh to heal. However, she did not make a claim, as her insurance company paid for the damages.

The prosecutor asked for 12 years in prison for the three defendants for the crime of arson endangering human life, to which an additional charge of making threats was added in the case of the main suspect, carrying a further one-year prison sentence.

However, all three defendants acknowledged their responsibility before the court, which led to a considerable reduction in the sentences. In the end, the main suspect was served a three-year prison sentence for arson and a 600-euro fine for the threats.

His friend and partner were sentenced to two years in prison as accomplices. The court decision is final.