Fife kebab shop owner jailed for attack on rival

Man downed four bottles of spirits before torching takeaway

A Fife kebab shop owner was jailed yesterday after he drunkenly torched a neighbour’s takeaway business.

Yusuf Topal faces deportation when he completes his three-year sentence for the attack on the Pizza Boy restaurant in Dunfermline.

The father of three downed two bottles of vodka and two bottles of whisky in the back room of his Turkish Kebab Shop, two doors along from the takeaway on Carnegie Drive, before driving to a local garage to buy petrol. The High Court in Livingston heard Topal, 44, was in a bad mood before he started the fire on May 10 2014.

A Fife kebab shop owner who torched a rival takeaway restaurant after getting drunk has been jailed for three years.

Yusuf Topal used petrol to start the fire at the Pizza Boy restaurant two doors away from his own business on Carnegie Drive, Dunfermline, in May 2014, the High Court at Livingston was told.

He had drunk two bottles of vodka and two bottles of whisky in the back room of his Turkish Kebab Shop before driving to a garage to buy the accelerant.

Jailing him yesterday, Judge Lord Mulholland said Topal had brought shame on himself and put lives at risk.

He described what the 44-year-old father of three had done as “unfathomable” given his age and lack of criminal record.

The Turkish immigrant, who has lived and worked in Scotland and England for 18 years, now faces being deported from the UK after he has served his sentence.

Lord Mulholland told Topal he had pled guilty to “surreptitiously” setting fire to the premises of a commercial rival after they had closed and the staff had gone home.

He said: “The fact that the fire did not spread further and cause more extensive damage and loss of life of the occupants of the neighbouring properties is down to the skill of firefighters, not you.

“You set the fire whilst heavily intoxicated, which is no excuse. If anything it is an aggravating factor.

“I consider that there is no sentence appropriate other than a sentence of imprisonment.”

Topal earlier pled guilty to wilful fireraising.

The court was told at an earlier hearing that a Pizza Boy worker had visited the accused’s restaurant on the evening of May 10 2014 to ask for change.

As an employee tried to hand over the money, he overheard Topal shout: “Why are you giving him it?” And the worker left the shop without the change.

When Pizza Boy closed for the night in the early hours of the morning, the same worker decided to drop in to the Turkish Kebab Shop to ask how the evening had gone.

One of the staff told him that it was not a good idea to come in as Topal was drunk and in a very bad mood.

Topal was eventually left alone in his takeaway but around 5am he got in a car, drove to a garage and bought a can of petrol.

He then headed to an alley next to Pizza Boy from which smoke was seen billowing minutes later.

Two police officers who were walking past spotted an extractor fan at the restaurant was alight and alerted the fire service.

Firefighters soon arrived to attend to the blaze which had spread into the takeaway. Nearby residents had to be evacuated.

The owners were left with a £10,000 repair bill.

You set the fire whilst heavily intoxicated, which is no excuse. If anything it is an aggravating factor. JUDGE LORD MULHOLLAND