The Courier & Advertiser (Angus and Dundee)
A Tayside businessman and his personal trainer have been jailed for a total of 11 years for setting fire to a policeman’s car outside his home.
Businessman and personal trainer sentenced to 11 years for deliberate car blaze at home of police officer
A businessman and his personal trainer were jailed for a total of 11 years yesterday following a fire attack on a car outside a policeman’s home.
A judge told William Handy and Craig Guest: “It was designed to intimidate a police officer who had been carrying out his lawful duties.”
Lord Woolman said the deliberate blaze was calculated to violate the home of PC David Farr and his private life.
The judge said a victim impact statement prepared by the officer spoke eloquently about the effect of the crime on him and that the whole incident had left him shaken and scared, and had affected his health and he felt he could not protect his family.
Lord Woolman, at the High court in Edinburgh, said it was fortunate the fuel tank of the vehicle did not explode and lucky that no one was injured.
He jailed former soldier Guest for six years after he ignited petrol poured on to the vehicle which was parked at the officer’s home in the Ballumbie area of Dundee.
The judge sentenced Handy to five years in jail after Guest was recruited to carry out the fireraising and told him: “You were the architect of this pernicious crime.”
Guest, 32, of Nelson Street, Dundee, had earlier admitted wilfully setting fire to the car on June 23 2014 and Handy, 54, of Middlebank Holding, Errol, was found guilty of the same charge after a trial.
The court heard that in early 2014 Handy believed the police were waging “an unfair campaign of harassment” against him.
Lord Woolman said they were actually conducting a lawful operation in the Tayside area which was not directed against him but he became of interest as an associate of others.
At one stage Handy was seen driving on the Perth to Dundee road by police and was signalled to stop. After he was pulled over he was placed in handcuffs.
Handy then used a website to search for the addresses of the constables and on several occasions in June expressed anger towards the police.
Guest was acting as a personal fitness trainer to Handy and Handy passed the officer’s address to him and claimed he was being hounded by the police.
The constable lived with his wife and infant daughter in a quiet residential
You were the architect of this pernicious crime. LORD WOOLMAN
street in Dundee but was wakened in the early hours of the morning by the sound of a car alarm. When they went to the window they saw his wife’s car, which was parked in front of their garage, was ablaze.
They phoned the fire brigade but before firefighters arrived the couple unsuccessfully tried to put out the fire with the aid of a neighbour. The car was a write-off.
Officers investigating the blaze discovered it had been started deliberately using petrol, and a tub which had held fuel was recovered and found to have Guest’s DNA present. Guest later confessed during a police interview that he started the fire.
Guest claimed that someone told him they wanted a car set alight but he refused to name the person for fear of reprisals against him and his young son.
He alleged he did not know who stayed at the house but later learnt it belonged to a policeman.
Defence counsel Gary Allan QC said that Guest had found himself in debt and was under significant pressure to repay it, but was unable to do so.
He added that Guest, who has previous convictions including for serious assault, accepted that any act of wilful fireraising was a serious crime.