Exclusive:Firebomb attack for drug debt left family-of-seven with baby trapped in torched house, Sheffield judge hears
The four adults and three children were rescued from their burning three-storey terraced home by neighbours using ladders or clambering onto adjacent roofs
Seven members of a family, including two children and a baby, were trapped in a burning house after a shocking firebomb attack.
The “revenge” arson attack was over a “conjured up” drug debt, Sheffield Crown Court heard.
The family of four adults and three children was rescued from their burning three-storey terraced home by neighbours using ladders or clambering onto adjacent roofs or garages.
Family members braved burning, smoke-filled corridors to pass the three children outside before escaping.
One adult had to jump from a window, breaking both legs.
Speaking about that night in a statement read to the court, he said: “I jumped and I prayed to god I would survive as the only other option was to stay in the house and die. To this day I’m amazed everyone managed to escape.”
Richard Canning, prosecuting, said the fire on November 25, 2023, at Warwick Street, Rotherham town centre, was likely motivated by a £40K to £50K drug debt owed by a member of the family.
Defendant Jamal Usman, 23, was understood to have been “used” by “more senior” members of a drug gang to torch the house with two other men, who have since fled the UK.
Judge Charles Thomas noted Usman was only 20 at the time, however he said: “The fact is, you were prepared to firebomb a residential address with only a flimsy assurance that there was nobody in the house.
“You are extremely lucky that seven people did not die as a result of what occurred on that evening.”
Prosecutor Mr Canning described how at 4.20am the sleeping family was awoken by smashing glass and a loud bang then saw “two figures” running down the street.
One family member described his “panic” as he struggled to breathe and couldn’t find anyone.
Two of his sisters - one a mother-of-three - battled through the smoke-filled house to carry the children and pass them out of upstairs windows.
The uninsured house, where the family’s grandmother had lived for 30 years, was gutted and left with an estimated repair bill of £130,000.
Usman was seen on CCTV in the lead-up to the arson attack at a petrol station with another male buying petrol in a jerry can before the pair collected another male in a taxi and went on to Warwick Street.
The can was then lit up and tossed through the smashed living room window of the property.
Giving the background to the arson attack, prosecutor Mr Canning said just over a year previously - in October 2022 - a grandchild of the house owners had drugs seized worth up to £50K during a police raid.
Judge Thomas told Usman: “The objective was to further a significant drugs operation amounting to ten of thousands of pounds.
“This was a revenge attack on a house because of a debt that it was perceived was owed by someone in that house.”
The court heard a probation report author was struck by Usman’s lack of remorse or empathy for his actions.
Assessing Usman as “dangerous”, the judge extended a six-year-and-four-month sentence with a three-year extended licence period. At least two-thirds of the jail term must be served in custody.
Usman, of no fixed abode, was already in jail for a drug supply conviction committed after the arson, when his latest case was heard this week.
He admitted arson with recklessness as to whether life was endangered.
Speaking after the hearing, a South Yorkshire Police spokesperson said: “We have no reports or intelligence to suggest the victims involved in this incident are involved in criminality.
"Further to this, we have no information to suggest any of those residing in the house at the time of this incident had any involvement in drug supply or the debt mentioned during the sentencing hearing."