Man Who Set Sportsman's Cafe Fire Gets 8 1/2 Years in Prison

Aaron Blow, 21, was sentenced to 8 1/2-years in prison for deliberately set a fire in a trash barrel outside Sportsman’s Cafe, a bar on Spruce Street, which burned down as a result, leaving two people homeless, according to a Hartford Courant report.

Blow was with a 16-year-old girl scrounging for cigarette butts in a trash barrel on the night of Dec. 20, 2013 when he became frustrated that he couldn’t find any and set the fire.

The sentence also includes 10 years of special parole. Prosecutor Anthony Bochicchio said that if the two people asleep in the building hadn’t woken up, Blow would be facing much more serious charges, according to the article.