Spurned lover burned himself as he started blaze in a rage

A JILTED lover who ended up burning himself when he torched the house he shared with his girlfriend was spared jail ‘because he was heartbroken’.

Kristaps Karnats downed a bottle of whisky and flew into a rage after his girlfriend dumped him following an argument, a court was told.

He ripped cabinets off the walls, smashed up furniture and threw paint around before piling clothes in the hallway and setting them alight.

As the flames took hold, he tried to pick up the clothes – and badly burnt both his hands.

At Warwick crown court, Karnats, 23, admitted arson and being reckless as to whether life was endangered.

But he was spared jail after judge Sylvia de Bertodano heard he had been ‘badly affected’ by the break-up and only intended to harm himself.

She told him: ‘You started a fire in the rented terraced house you were sharing with your girlfriend. Fortunately the fire service were called very quickly and were able to put out the fire which had spread in the hall and on the stairs. You had started it deliberately ‘Acute reaction’: Kristaps Karnats flew into a rage after being dumped by his first-ever girlfriend by piling clothes and setting light to them. It is very fortunate it didn’t spread any further.

‘It was clearly very dangerous, as you know because you burned yourself quite significantly. Fires get out of control very, very quickly indeed.

‘If a fire is started in a terraced house it can easily spread to the house next door, where we know a vulnerable person lived. But there is nothing to suggest you are a young man who would normally behave in this way.

‘You were very badly affected by the breakdown of your relationship, and this was an acute reaction to that.’ Karnats, of Coventry, was given a twoyear suspended sentence.

The court heard the house had been the family home of Karnat’s exgirlfriend before they rented it together.

Nicola Purches, defending, told the court it was ‘a stress reaction to the loss of his partner, who had been his first and only girlfriend’.