Terrified family left trapped in 8th-floor Leeds flat after pair start fire outside their door

The pair admitted being responsible for the blaze on the 8th floor of Gamble Hill Grange in the Gamble Hill area.

Anne Kershaw tried to start the fire over a supposed £40 debt, before neighbour Nataniel Mroz helped reignite it minutes later.

They both admitted arson recklessness as to whether life was endangered.

Leeds Crown Court heard that the family on the eighth floor had been getting ready for bed at around 11.15pm on November 19 last year, when their smoke alarms were triggered.

They saw smoke coming in through the door so frantically rang 999 because they had no other way to exit the premises.

More than £4,200 worth of damage was caused, but luckily none of the four occupants were hurt.

CCTV showed 52-year-old Kershaw approaching the front door minutes before the alarms sounded.

She put a black coat on the floor next to the victims’ front door and appeared to put a lit cigarette to it. She was then seen to walk away before glancing back and getting into the lift.

Shortly after, 18-year-old Mroz was seen exiting the lift with another male and walk towards the smouldering coat.

He then leant down and put a lit cannabis joint to the coat, which appeared to revive the fire against the door.

Both were later arrested and interviewed. Kershaw said she was drunk at the time and was angry about £40 she said the man who lived at the flat owed her.

She said she bumped into Mroz, a neighbour in the same tower block, and told him about what she had done, so he had gone to have a look.

Mroz told police that he had been smoking cannabis all day with his friend. He confirmed Kershaw told him what she had done, so they went to the eighth floor.

He said Kershaw had even told him she had put an accelerant on the coat to make it burn quicker. He admitted then “enhancing the fire”.

Kershaw has 10 previous convictions, including drink driving, resisting arrest, common assault and being drunk and disorderly.

Mitigating, Zareen Alam-Cheetham said despite her criminal record, this was very much “out of character”.

She said she struggled with her mental health and vulnerable as a result. However, it was accepted that Kershaw “had a history of impulsive behaviour” while drunk, as she was on this occasion.

Kershaw worked as an NHS medical secretary for 21 years. She said she had been held on remand since that night and her mental health was “worse than ever”.

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For Mroz, Ian Hudson said he had never been in trouble before. He said that Mroz was “effectively eating pizza and smoking cannabis” that night and had only gone to “have a look” at the fire.

Mr Hudson said: “He made the foolish decision to stick his lit cannabis joint onto it which caused combustion. He is regretful of that.”

He had also been held on remand, at HMP Doncaster, and was “finding it difficult”.

Judge Tahir Khan KC jailed Mroz for 27 months and Kershaw for three years.