SEATTLE – Two men who started a multimillion-dollar condominium fire in Edmonds will get prison time and were ordered to pay nearly $6 million in restitution.
Daniel William Shreve, 20, of Everett was sentenced to five years in a federal prison Friday in U.S. District Court. Co-defendant Random Scott Haug, 22, of Snohomish was sentenced to more than 31/2 years.
Judge John Coughenour also ordered them to pay for the damage to The Gregory, a condominium that was under construction in downtown Edmonds, and a for a second fire they set a month later at Alder Biopharmaceuticals Inc. in Bothell.
A teenage boy accompanied the men when both fires were set.
Both men pleaded guilty in October.
The Dec. 17, 2005, fire at The Gregory was started only after the men and the teen returned twice to the structure to make sure the fire got going.
The intense condo fire, which threatened surrounding buildings, was started by gasoline that Shreve and the boy poured in the building.
Shreve originally attempted to start the fire by throwing a Molotov cocktail made from gas, Styrofoam and a juice bottle into the building, documents said.
When that didn’t work, Haug drove the group to a gas station, where the boy filled a jar with gasoline. The group returned to the condo and the boy and Shreve poured the additional gas on the construction site and lit it, according to court documents.
Shreve and the juvenile returned to the building to make sure the fire continued burning, and even piled more combustibles on the flames to make sure the fire would continue, the government said.
On Jan. 12, 2006, the three also attempted to burn down the Bothell pharmaceutical company.
The three stole several propane tanks and Shreve lit one of the tanks and threw it through the front window of the business.
The tank burned for a short time and charred the floor, but did not set the building on fire, documents said.
The owner of the condominium project, Bob Gregg, told the court the condos were just 90 days from completion at the time of the fire.
More than two dozen units had been sold, and some buyers had sold their homes anticipating a move into their new condo, Gregg told the court.
Some buyers had to live in hotels, scrambling to find places to live while construction started over, Gregg said at sentencing.
Subcontractors on the project had to shut down and lay off more than 80 employees eight days before Christmas.
Gregg told the judge that it will be three or four years before he is back financially to where he was before the fire.
Reporter Jim Haley: 425-339-3447 or haley@heraldnet.com.
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