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Police have condemned an arsonist who torched a Sheffield pub twice while people were sleeping upstairs, claiming his actions could ‘quite easily have proven fatal’.

Giovanni Bearder set fire to The Sheaf Hotel pub on Bramall Lane twice in the dead of night on August 24, 2021 and September 5, 2021, while the landlady and her partner were sleeping upstairs on both occasions.

During a September 9 hearing at Sheffield Crown Court, Judge Graham Robinson jailed Bearder, aged 24, for 56 months after he pleaded guilty to two counts of arson, being reckless as to whether life was endangered.

Speaking after the sentencing, Investigating officer PC Louise Atha said: “Bearder’s actions could quite easily have proven fatal, as fires are highly dangerous and unpredictable.

Police have condemned the actions of hired arsonist, Giovanni Bearder, who set fire to the Sheaf House Hotel pub twice in the space of a fortnight while people were sleeping upstairs

“As is the case with many pubs across the country, there is a residence attached to the pub and in this case, there was a family living in that residence.

“It must have been a very scary experience for the victims, who were asleep when both arson attacks took place, to wake up and find their business and home on fire. I am pleased that Bearder has now been convicted and sentenced to time in prison for his crimes.”

Jail time for hired arsonist who torched Sheffield pub with 'Molotov cocktail' w...

The court was told how Bearder, of no fixed abode, claimed he had been paid £300 to set the fires, after being approached by ‘three Asian males’ in Worksop while sleeping rough.

He has not provided any more information about the individuals who reportedly paid him to commit arson, or their motivation for doing so.

In a victim impact statement read to the court, the pub’s landlady said the fact she still does not know why Bearder was paid to set the fires concerns her, as does knowing those responsible are still out there.

On both occasions, the landlady and her partner were alerted to the blazes by the fire alarm sounding, before the landlady’s partner went downstairs and successfully extinguished the fires, which were started in seating areas located in the pub.

Police found evidence of petrol being used as an accelerant, as part of what Judge Robinson described as a ‘Molotov cocktail,’ in the first blaze, and DNA Bearder left at the scene linked him to both fires.

Hired arsonist who set popular Sheffield pub ablaze twice condemned by Sheffield cops