Mum set fire to home while her kids were inside
AMUM-OF-SEVEN drunkenly started a fire in her own living room while two of her young children were upstairs.
Jacqueline Robinson, 50, downed two bottles of wine before setting fire to newspapers and curtains and passing out on the couch of her Ainsdale home on October 23 last year.
Robinson’s neighbour Mr Heaton was alerted by the sound of a blaring smoke alarm before hearing the screams of the two young children who said that their mum was still inside.
Mr Heaton and another neighbour ran into the burning building and carried the Pontins worker off the sofa and out to safety where she was then treated by paramedics.
Prosecuting at Liverpool Crown Court, Mike Stephenson said Robinson had little memory of the event and could offer no explanation for her actions.
Mr Stephenson explained that the mum-of-seven lived at the house with three of her children, including an 18-year-old son and two girls under the age of 10.
He said: “Earlier that day, she’d been involved in an altercation at their school about using the right gate to exit. She was reluctant to use the school’s preference because she previously had an accident there. In fairness, she doesn’t say that had anything to do with what followed.
“She went home with her children, she had a quantity to drink. At some point that evening, and for no reason she can recall, she started a fire with a scrunched up piece of paper and a cigarette lighter and ignited the curtains as well.
“Mr Heaton, a neighbour, had been aware of an audible smoke alarm and the girls, who were still in school uniform, screaming in distress.
“They indicated that their mum was still inside and he realised a bright light was actually a fire.”
The two neighbours
carried
the woman to safety and she later discharged herself. A police search then took place when it became apparent the fire was started deliberately and Mrs Robinson was quickly located.
When interviewed, she gave no reason for her actions.
Paramedics overheard a comment stating that “I don’t want to be here any more” which raised concerns over suicidal tendencies.
However, the author of a psychiatric report concluded that Robinson was not suffering from any mental health issues at that time and that no such issues played a part in what happened.
Mr Stephenson added that “the house was in some state of neglect and she hadn’t bothered tidying for six months”.
Although she has previous convictions for minor, unrelated offences, none were committed in the last 30 years.
Defending, Matthew O’Neill said Robinson has little recollection of what happened that night but accepted she was responsible and felt deeply ashamed.
He said: “It has been difficult for her to understand and get her head around the fact that she set alight a number of newspapers which had the potential to harm her two children who she loves very much.”
Mr O’Neill continued: “She now has spent the best part of five months in custody. It has been a very difficult time for her being away from her children and also being confined to a cell for 23 hours a day as all prisoners currently are due to the Covid-19 pandemic.”
He said she had told the authors of both the probation and psychiatric reports that the pressures of life had taken hold and she had been drinking more and more.
On that night she had drunk two bottles of wine which “gives some indication as to how she came to be unconscious in her own home after setting a fire with her two young children present.”
Mr O’Neill suggested that a suspended sentence could be given and that the impact on her family had been significant, with the eldest daughter now looking after the two young girls.
Sentencing, Recorder Richard Archer said that everyone including Robinson was at a loss to explain what has caused her to start the fire that night. But, he said, it was not the court’s job to answer why she did what she did, but instead to impose a penalty that ensures public safety.
He said: “For a fire to be set in a semidetached property in the presence of others, in particular the presence of children, can only give rise to significant risk of serious harm.
The offence was aggravated by the influence of alcohol but he accepted her remorse, shame and previous good character as mitigation.
Robinson, who pleaded guilty to arson being reckless as to whether life was endangered at an earlier hearing, was handed a 33-month sentence.