A man who set fire to a sex shop on the Lower Bristol Road last year has denied the charges of intent to danger life after throwing fuel around the premises and throwing a match into the door.
Bristol Crown Court has been told how Neil Andersen fled after telling the shop worker “I’ve got a surprise for you.”
Andersen, who lives in Bath, has denied the charges of arson with intent to endanger life and arson being reckless as to whether life was endangered.
The family living in the flat above the shop was put at risk, the jury was told.
Prosecutor Richard Posner told the jury that Andersen was not acting impulsively and he had pre-planned the attack.
He told that on the night of the 21th October last year the defendant bought a green fuel container, petrol from the nearby Sainsbury’s filling station and then walked to the Private shop and carried out the attack.
A shop worker Mark Morris told the court Mr Andersen entered the premises and pulled the petrol container from his rucksack.
“I stood there at first watching it. I was in shock,” he said.
“The next thing I know the petrol’s coming at me. I thought that was to get me out of the way.
“He kept saying, ‘This isn’t right’. I said to him there was a family upstairs – that’s the main thing that stuck in my mind.
“He mumbled something about God, so I thought it was a religious act because he didn’t like what we were doing.“
Mr Posner told the jury that Mr Andersen did not accept that the actions he took were reckless or that he was endangering the lives of others.
“He says he did not appreciate that anyone was going to be upstairs.
“That was not something that was forming part of his thought process,” the prosecutor said.
“He says that his frustrations were focused at the company.”
The original article from last year can be found here.
