A dinner party host has been jailed after he started a £70,000 fire with a blowtorch which he had been using to light a chimenea.
He lit the torch and was aiming it at the officers when he set light to a dressing gown hung over a bedroom door and he went on to shut himself inside and set light to a mattress.
The fire spread through the top floor of the house in Ogwell and caused £70,000 damage, of which £19,000 was uninsured.
He told him: ‘This was potentially very dangerous. You were waving the blowtorch around in an attempt to keep the police away and set light to material in a bedroom.
‘The fire took hold and caused very substantial damage, of which £19,000 was uninsured. It has had a huge effect on the victim’s life.’
Mr David Bowen, prosecuting, said Mayo was staying with the victim at her home in Ogwell, near Newton Abbot, on August 16 last year when he started the fire.
He said they had a meal with friends, gone out to walk a dog, and returned home before he became agitated, causing his partner to call the police and ambulance.
Ms Cullen then saw him coming upstairs with a lit blowtorch which he pointed towards her. He also waved it at five police officers when they attended and set light to a door.
He shut himself in the bedroom where a mattress was set alight. Police were forced out by the smoke and Mayo escaped out of the back of the house and was arrested later after falling into a quarry and suffering a leg injury.
The home owner has been left £19,000 out of pocket and has still not been able to return home where £70,000 damage is being repaired.
Miss Mary McCarthy, mitigating, said Mayo had problems arising from a troubled childhood and was using the blowtorch to keep the police away because he feared he would be tasered.
She said he had the blowtorch to hand because he had used it to light a chimenea earlier in the evening.