Arsonist had taken cocaine and alcohol
Oct 28 2008 The Journal
A DEPRESSED man risked his neighbours' lives by setting his terraced home alight in a drug-induced psychosis.
James Oxley caused damage estimated at £25,000 damage by throwing a lit towel down the stairs, believing people "out to get him" were in the house.
He alerted nearby occupants after escaping to safety from a first-floor window as the fire spread, telling one: “I’ve set my home on fire to get away from them.” The blaze almost destroyed the staircase in the property which Oxley had shared with his former partner until their relationship broke-up a few weeks earlier.
Four houses either side of the property in Wellington Street, Lemington, Newcastle, also had to be evacuated because of concern the early-hours fire might spread.
Oxley, who was seen to be in an agitated and distressed state at the scene, produced a bag of cocaine from his pocket when spoken to by police.
He later told officers he had been aware someone was trying to force their way into the house and fearing for his safety, ran upstairs got a towel and set it on fire to protect himself.
A psychiatric report concluded at the time of the fire in November last year, Oxley was suffering from a drug-induced psychosis, Newcastle Crown Court was told. Oxley, a former serviceman with no previous convictions and employed as an electrical contractor, admitted arson being reckless whether life would be endangered.
Jane Foley, defending, said Oxley was an otherwise hard-working man who had been suffering an emotional breakdown at the time.
She said: “The fire was not motivated by malice, revenge, jealousy or anything like that. He had not been sleeping for some time due to the emotional distress he was in following the breakdown of his relationship.
“He had taken a large quantity of cocaine – he accepts that isn’t a defence to this matter – and also taken alcohol. He was in a bad way, suffering depression.
“It was a genuine fear at the time that people were out to get him.”
Ms Foley said Oxley’s family had been left “devastated” and Oxley had been living in dread of going to prison.
Jailing Oxley for 30 months, Judge Guy Whitburn said he gave him credit for his guilty plea and previous good character.
But he told him: “You caused a considerable amount of damage. The drug-induced psychosis was caused by the ingestion of a large quantity of cocaine.
“Had this fire spread – and I have seen the amount of damage you caused – it could have injured or killed others as well.
“Personal mitigation there may be, but there is no mitigation whatever in what you did and the threat what you did posed to those who lived close to you.”
