Life sentence for young man who set fire to step-grandmother’s house: he confessed during ‘do, dare or the truth’ | Abroad

The fire brigade was called on May 28, 2018 for a serious fire in a bungalow in Heysham, in the British Lancashire. The rescuers rushed to find the 94-year-old resident, Mary Gregory, under a table in the storage room. Four days later, she died in hospital from the large amount of smoke she had inhaled.

The initial investigation indicated that the fire that killed Gregory may have been an accident, and the coroner agreed. A year later, that suddenly changed. Police reopened the investigation after 19-year-old Tiernan Darnton talked over his mouth during a game of ‘do, dare or be true’ with two friends.

Dementia

He then told how he started the deadly fire in his step-grandmother’s house by setting fire to the curtains with a lighter. “I have a secret that I have never told anyone. I may have killed someone,” he said. When asked for more explanation, the then-teenager said he set the fire because he didn’t want his step-grandmother to live with dementia. The friends didn’t believe him and convinced him not to say anything more about it.

But Darnton was not silent. He told a youth worker in May 2019 that a friend “has information about him that should send him to jail.” He added that at one point he felt “very strong” – presumably during his step-grandmother’s funeral – because he was the only person in the room who knew what had happened to the deceased. “Now tell me you killed someone,” the youth worker asked, and Darnton confirmed. A week later, he told her and his stepfather Chris Gregory that he had started the fire.

The police then reopened the case and during interrogations Darnton told the whole story. He told how he set up a table in front of the storage room door, cut the telephone cable and dismantled the smoke alarm. All to prevent his step-grandmother from escaping. In his house, agents even found drawings on which he had prepared the plan. In addition to an alibi, it listed things like “good hiding place” and “quick escape route.” On his cell phone and laptop, detectives found multiple searches after the fire, including “I’m a murderer” and “I’m a monster and I’m going to hell”.

Misunderstanding

During the murder trial, Darnton tried to dismiss the case as “a big misunderstanding” and claimed that his confession had been lied to to impress friends. “I know how sick that is of me,” he said. It was a cry for attention, he emphasized. But the judge did not believe him and sentenced him to life in prison, with a minimum of 15 years.

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