Firestarter avoids jail time

A woman who set fire to a Motherwell home, putting a child’s life in danger, has avoided a prison sentence.

Akbibi Macmillan suffered fractures to her back and ribs when she fell as she tried to get out of the blazing property in Morven Drive.

However, a boy aged eight and two females escaped unhurt.

Macmillan, 51, claimed the fire on July 18, 2020, started accidentally, but she was convicted of fireraising after trial at Hamilton Sheriff Court. Police officers who were at her hospital bedside told the court she handed them a note intended for her husband that read ‘I know sorry is not enough for what I did, but it was not planned or anything’.

In the note she asked her husband to look after two children. PC Andrew Hossack said: “She was very emotional and was ranting and raving. She kept trying to sit up in bed and kept saying she was sorry.”

The blaze broke out about noon and the court heard a neighbour used a ladder to rescue occupants from an upstairs room.

Detective Sergeant Scott Wilson said separate fires appeared to have been started in the kitchen and the dining room.

Giving evidence, Macmillan, who was born in Kazakhstan, said she usually smoked outside the house, but on that particular day she had a cigarette indoors because she was upset.

Her husband had left her and that morning she had argued with him on the phone. She admitted she was “really emotional”.

Macmillan said she had been using a candle on the dining room table as an ashtray and that was where the fire started. She grabbed a dishtowel and “flapped” with it, trying to put out the flames.

She remembered taking the towel into the kitchen and thought she’d put it in the sink, but she accepted she might have left it on top of a cupboard.

Asked if she had intentionally set fire to the house, Macmillan replied: “No.” Her lawyer said at the time of the fire his client was suffering from “extremely poor mental health”

He added: “She used alcohol as a coping strategy. “

Sheriff Martin Jones told Macmillan: “It’s clear you were suffering from various emotional problems at that time. I fully understand you got to the stage where you thought things were hopeless, but that does not excuse the conduct the jury convicted you of.

“Normally an offence of this nature would attract a lengthy prison sentence, but in the circumstances I have decided to impose an alternative to custody.”

She will be under supervision for two years and must attend counselling if required and must carry out 200 hours of unpaid community work and will be electronically tagged for six months.