Pensioner Burned Down House With Blowtorch 'To Stop Estranged Wife Getting Share'

A pensioner burned down his £550,000 house with a blowtorch to stop his estranged wife from getting her share, a court has heard.

John McCorry, 75, was unhappy about the upcoming sale of his cottage in Kennford, near Exeter - where he and his wife Hilary had lived for 20 years.

He had been drinking on 17 June last year - three days before the property was due to be sold - when he set the workshop on fire with a blow torch, Exeter Crown Court heard.

Exeter Crown Court Service

He then sat in a chair and drank whiskey as the flames spread, before telling a neighbour: "I'm watching it burn."

The property was due to be sold three days later for £550,000, but the damage was such that it recently sold for £320,000.

McCorry had prevented his wife from removing her belongings earlier in the day and the property was not insured because he had stopped paying premiums without telling his wife, the court heard.

Hilary said her husband was unhappy about their impending divorce.

According to the Daily Mail, she said: "It did bother him.

"He was also very angry that I had left him. I think he set fire to the house out of spite."

McCorry admitted arson and being reckless as to whether life was endangered, but denied starting the fire deliberately, claiming that he had been drinking and smoking, and could only sit and watch because he was in shock.

He said: "I did not want a divorce. I was not seeking a divorce. I did not want to move out of the house. That came from her end. I was not angry, I was upset.

"My home life was coming apart. She had relations and children and grandchildren. I had nothing and nowhere to go. I thought I would end up in a bed and breakfast.

"If the sale had gone through, I was due more than a quarter of a million but I didn't have a clue when I was going to get the money."

Judge Keith Cutler dismissed McCorry's account of events.

PA

According to the Daily Mail, he said: "This is a very sad case. It may be that the drink he had taken brought on a maudlin and depressed mood and he was thinking about leaving the house he had known and loved.

"He felt resentment about it all. This was a fire started deliberately out of animosity towards his ex-wife with the intention of burning the property down.

"It may have been inspired by him being depressed, but that is what he did and that is why he was in the garden watching the house burn down."

Sentencing has been adjourned until August and McCorry has been granted conditional bail.

Topics: UK News, crime

Jake Massey

Jake Massey is a journalist at LADbible. He graduated from Newcastle University, where he learnt a bit about media and a lot about living without heating. After spending a few years in Australia and New Zealand, Jake secured a role at an obscure radio station in Norwich, inadvertently becoming a real-life Alan Partridge in the process. From there, Jake became a reporter at the Eastern Daily Press. Jake enjoys playing football, listening to music and writing about himself in the third person.

@jakesmassey