Man who set fire to home of ex-girlfriend gets 22 years

Attorney: He’ll serve federal, state sentences concurrently

After initially receiving a sentence of time served, a Baltimore man was sentenced this week to 22 years in prison for setting fire to his girlfriend’s rowhouse while she and others were inside.

Luther Moody Trent, 22, had admitted to pouring gasoline on his ex-girlfriend’s house in the 1900 block of Linden Avenue on May 21, 2021, and lighting it on fire. On Tuesday, a Baltimore Circuit Court judge sentenced Trent to 40 years with all but 22 years suspended, said his attorney, Allan Rombro.

In June, Trent pleaded guilty to one federal count of malicious destruction and was sentenced last month to 12 years in federal prison. Trent will serve the sentences concurrently, his attorney said.

Rombro said his client is currently in federal custody, and is still awaiting a permanent placement to serve his federal sentence. After his federal sentence is completed, he will then complete his sentence from Baltimore Circuit Court at a state facility.

It’s unusual for defendants to face local and federal prosecutions. Typically, once federal prosecutors take a state case, local prosecutors dismiss their charges.

“This is the first time in my 33 years that the state has kept a case after the feds indicted,” Rombro said.

“He is a sacrificial lamb,” Rombro said of his client.

He argued that the case was used by State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby’s opponents to hurt her reputation as she ran for reelection. Mosby lost the July primary.

“Everyone was using [the case] to try to point to a failing in her office and she decided to come back strong,” Rombro said.

Initially, when the case went forward in Baltimore Circuit Court in December, Trent and prosecutors from the Baltimore State’s Attorney’s Office agreed upon a plea with a sentence of time served, which was then accepted by Baltimore Circuit Court Judge Melissa M. Phinn.

Later, Thiru Vignarajah, an attorney for the victims and who ran unsuccessfully for state’s attorney, filed a motion arguing the judge erred in accepting the plea before hearing from two victims who were inside the house the night it caught fire and without the third victim having a fair opportunity to give a victim-impact statement.

Phinn vacated the plea in February and reinstated the indictment, and Trent was taken back into state custody and later charged federally.

“The story of Luther Trent reflects the best and worst of Baltimore,” Vignarajah said in a statement this week. “It should remain a cause for alarm that a man charged with attempted murder and arson was sent home over the objection of victims who had the courage to stand up to him.”

He said the case, however, also “shows it is possible to deliver justice in Baltimore. For us, this brings a measure of closure to what has been a traumatic nightmare. From the night of the attack last summer to city prosecutors cutting [Trent] loose last winter to the defendant telling the world he should never have been let out, this prosecution was a case study in the failures of the city justice system.”