Former firefighter Sardoala sentenced to six years and six months in prison for arson

The court of Santarem sentenced a former firefighter to six years and six months in prison for setting eight forest fires in the municipalities of Sardoal (Santaren) and Vila de Rei (Castelo Branco) in the summer of 2022.

The June 1 judgment, reported on Monday by the Regional Network and accessed by the Lusa news agency, proved that in two cases the man, now 44, set the fire.

According to the court, on June 15, 2022, the man set fire to the fire with a lighter and ignition for two hours, and on August 23, he set fire to the vegetation in the area of ​​two buildings with a lighter for five minutes.

In addition, it also caused forest fires on June 18 and 27 and August 2 of the same year.

The court found that, as a result of its actions, about 55 hectares of shrubs and forests were burned (thousands of pines, eucalyptus trees, and cork oaks were affected), causing damage in the amount of about 100 thousand euros.

In the verdict, the panel of judges of the Santarém Criminal Court emphasizes the fact that the acts were committed during a critical period of fire danger and that the man acted with direct intent.

During the trial, the man fully confessed to the facts that he was accused of by the public ministry, expressing regret, stating that he was drunk at the time and had stopped taking medication for depression, diagnosed in 2013.

He also said that after the fait accompli he quit drinking and sought help from the Abrantes Alcoholism Treatment Center while on a waiting list to enter the therapeutic community, the verdict says.

The man, an operations assistant for the municipality of Sardoal, was removed from his duties, and the municipality admitted that it could reinstate him for other tasks.

The former firefighter joined the Sardoal volunteers in 1995, where he remained until 2003. Re-admitted in early May 2015, he was rehabilitated at the end of the same month.

The court justified the punishment as “a high need for general prevention”, since it was “very serious behavior that caused high and growing anxiety and social insecurity on the part of citizens.”

The ruling highlights the “frequency of crimes of this kind in the summer, dry weather and high temperatures”, which leads to “massive destruction” of forests and endangers the homes and lives of people living on lands adjacent to the burnt forests.

The Collective also highlighted the fact that he is a firefighter “of whom a different type of behavior is expected and demanded, while the defendant acts with a serious and pointed disregard for the functional duties and ethical and professional standards of behavior to which he was obliged.”

As regards the sentence, which could be up to 16 years and three months’ imprisonment, the Court took into account the fact that the defendant fully and unreservedly confessed that he had no recorded criminal record and that he was professionally and socially integrated.

The man remains under house arrest pending a decision to serve his sentence.