{"id":639921,"date":"2026-06-15T13:45:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-15T13:45:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/639921\/"},"modified":"2026-06-15T13:45:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-15T13:45:09","slug":"two-men-found-guilty-over-arson-attacks-linked-to-keir-starmer-uk-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/639921\/","title":{"rendered":"Two men found guilty over arson attacks linked to Keir Starmer | UK news"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two men have been found guilty of conspiring to carry out arson attacks on property and a car connected to Keir Starmer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Roman Lavrynovych, 22, from Ukraine, and Stanislav Carpiuc, 27, from Romania, were found guilty at the Old Bailey on Monday. Another Ukrainian man, Petro Pochynok, 35, was cleared of the same charge.<\/p>\n

Lavrynovych was also convicted of damaging two properties by fire being reckless as to whether life was endangered on 11 and 12 May last year. He was acquitted of two counts of committing arson with intent to risk life.<\/p>\n

Mr Justice Garnham remanded the defendants into custody to be sentenced on Friday. Jurors deliberated for seven hours and 26 minutes before reaching their unanimous verdicts. Lavrynovych and Carpiuc will be sentenced at the Old Bailey on Friday.<\/p>\n

During a months-long trial, the jury heard that the three men were offered payment to set fire to a car and two houses linked to Starmer by a mysterious Russian-speaking figure named El Money, or \u201cHroshi\u201d in Ukrainian.<\/p>\n

The anonymous contact, who communicated in Russian, offered Lavrynovych \u00a33,000 in cryptocurrency if he set the fires, filmed them, and got them on the news.<\/p>\n

Starmer\u2019s sister-in-law, Judith Alexander, was living with her partner and daughter in the prime minister\u2019s former home in Kentish Town when the front door was set ablaze on 12 May 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did not see anyone on the street,\u201d Alexander told the court in April, \u201cbut when I looked down I saw smoke and an orange glow where the front door was.\u201d<\/p>\n

Following the arson attacks, El Money told Lavrynovych to leave the UK. \u201cLook, you attacked the home of a very high-ranking person in Britain,\u201d El Money wrote on Telegram. \u201cI\u2019ll send you money, you need to leave the city.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lavyronvych was arrested at his home in Sydenham, south-east London, on 13 May 2025. Carpiuc was arrested on 17 May at Luton airport, while waiting to board a flight to Romania.<\/p>\n

Commander Helen Flanagan, the head of counter-terrorism policing London, said there was \u201cno ideological motivation\u201d for the defendants and \u201cno evidence to suggest that they knew who they were targeting, and that that was the prime minister or properties linked to the prime minister\u201d.<\/p>\n

She added: \u201cHowever, clearly the intention from the online tasker was to create fear, both for the victim and the prime minister, and cause uncertainty, unrest, for the UK.\u201d<\/p>\n

After the verdicts, the chief prosecutor, Frank Ferguson, said: \u201cThese were deliberate and dangerous acts of arson carried out against properties and a vehicle linked to the prime minister, and they posed a serious risk to life.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuch offences go beyond damage to property \u2013 they are intended to intimidate and undermine public confidence, and that will not be tolerated.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two men have been found guilty of conspiring to carry out arson attacks on property and a car…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":639922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":["post-639921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=639921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/639921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/639922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=639921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=639921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=639921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}