A St. Paul man who set a fire outside the downtown St. Paul Lunds & Byerlys last year — a blaze that caused over half a million dollars in damage and closed the grocery store for three days — was sentenced Friday to three years of probation.
Timothy John Arsenal, 37, pleaded guilty in January to a starting a recycling bin on fire, which quickly spread and caused extensive damage to the grocery store’s facade and canopy.
Two days after the March 29 fire, Arsenal kicked out a glass window at a Green Line station at Fairview and University avenues and threw a trash can lid at a moving train, according to a criminal complaint in that case charging him with first-degree criminal damage to property.
St. Paul police issued a pickup-and-hold for Arsenal and Metro Transit police arrested him April 1, 2022.
At the time, Arsenal was a three-time convicted felon on probation until October 2024. He was civilly committed as mentally ill in 2015, 2016 and 2020, according to court records. The last commitment expired April 8, 2021.
Case against him
According to the criminal complaint in the arson case, a St. Paul police officer around 1:30 a.m. saw flames coming from trash bins next to the exterior wall of the grocery store’s main entrance at Tenth and Robert streets. The fire’s size and heat stopped the officer from attempting to put it out.
Firefighters extinguished the blaze before it spread to the inside of the store or above to the Penfield apartments.
Overall damage was estimated between $500,000 and $800,000.
Surveillance video showed a man carrying a white plastic bag and wearing a dark-colored baseball cap, dark-colored pants and a light-colored hoodie approach the trash and recycling bins. He placed his hand into a recycling bin, which then ignited into an active fire.
An investigator contacted Regions Hospital to see if they possibly had video of the suspect. Hospital staff said a man matching the description may have been a patient.
Video surveillance showed Arsenal leaving the hospital at around 12:50 a.m. while carrying white plastic bags and wearing the same hat and clothing as the arsonist. The complaint does not say why Arsenal had been at Regions.
At the time of his arrest, he was wearing the same hoodie and had a lighter with him, according to the complaint.
Sentencing
Arsenal has a lengthy criminal history with convictions dating to 2005. His previous three felony convictions were for burglary in 2007, possession of a controlled substance in 2020 and theft in 2021, for which he was sentenced in October 2021 to 86 days in jail and three years of probation.
For violating probation with the new charges, Arsenal was sentenced this past February to 60 days in the Ramsey County workhouse, while a 15-month prison sentence was stayed.
On Friday, Arsenal was back in court on the arson and property damage cases. Ramsey County District Judge Nicole Starr sentenced him to 17 months in prison and stayed the time on the condition that he complete terms of three years of probation, along with chemical health and mental health programming.
