MOTEL GUNMAN ADMITS SETTING ROOM ON FIRE
Pleads guilty to arson in connection with standoff at Super 8 in Kingston
A 37-yearold Hurley man who set fire to a room at the Super 8 hotel on Washington Avenue after threatening police with a gun has pleaded guilty to arson, the Ulster County District Attorney’s Office said Monday.
Dennis O. Stokes, 37, of DeWitt Mills Road, entered his plea Friday in Ulster County Court in connection with the Jan. 2 incident, the District Attorney’s Office said.
Police descended on the hotel about noon that day after being alerted about an armed man who was barricaded in Room 241 on the second floor.
Stokes, who was alone in the room, refused to let police enter and threat-
ened to “come out blazing” and kill people, according to District Attorney Holley Carnright.
During the ensuing standoff, Stokes threatened police with what appeared to be a handgun but turned out to be a BB gun that Carnright said was “very realistic looking.”
Det. Sgt. Brian Robertson, a Kingston Police Department negotiator, said on the day of the incident that Stokes pointed the gun directly at officers numerous times during the standoff. Photos from the scene show Stokes leaning out the window of the room and pointing a gun that he’s holding with both hands.
The standoff lasted until shortly before 5 p.m., when Stokes sprayed lighter fluid in the room, ignited it and, driven by the intense heat of the fire, jumped out the window. He was taken into custody immediately.
The room was heavily damaged by the fire and there was minor damage in the adjoining hallway. And up to 40 rooms in one wing of the hotel sustained smoke and water damage.
The BB gun, melted, was recovered inside Stokes’ room, authorities said.
Kingston Police Detective Lt. Thierry Croizer said at the time that officers exhibited “great restraint, professionalism and great training” during the incident.
“I am ecstatic it ended in the way it did,” he said.
No guests of the hotel were injured in the incident.
During part of the standoff, some police were stationed on the roof of the Daily Freeman building at 79 Hurley Ave., from where they had a clear view of Stokes’ room at the adjacent hotel.
Stokes served two terms in state prison for burglary, according to the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.
He was released from Downstate Correctional Facility in Fishkill on March 7, 2016, after serving a sevenyear sentence. In October 2007, he was released from the Mid-State Correctional Facility in Marcy after serving two years and eight months of a 3.5-year sentence.
Stokes was arrested, convicted and sentenced in Ulster County for both burglaries, and he was released on parole after each incarceration. The second prison term appeared to be the result of a residential burglary in 2008 in the town of Ulster.
Stokes was wanted on a parole violation warrant at the time of the Super 8 incident, having failed to show up for a weekly meeting with his parole officer, authorities said.
Stokes is to be sentenced on the arson charge on Dec. 20, the district attorney said.