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A US woman in Oregon was convicted of igniting an enormous wildfire simply to give
firefighters something to put out will now spend more than one year in jail, AP reports.
On
Wednesday, Sadie Renee Johnson, 23, was sentenced to 18 months in prison by US
District Judge Marco Hernandez. In May, she pleaded guilty to sparking a fire
that burned through 51,000 acres southeast of Portland, Oregon, back in July
2013. The fire ravaged the Warm Springs Indian Reservation for more than a week
and cost almost $8 million to extinguish.
Johnson
will also perform 200 hours of community service in the affected area, a
sentence that Hernandez reportedly considered light, according to the Associated
Press.
"You
owe them much more than that," he said to her in
court.
The
fire began when Johnson threw a firework out of her car and lit up some brush,
as noted by Reuters. Two days later, with the fire still raging, Johnson posted
a status update on Facebook that read, “Like
my fire?” which led detectives to detain her. Johnson eventually
claimed that she started the fire because her friends in the fire department “were bored and needed work.”
The
young woman has also stated she does have substance abuse problems, something
that was taken into account by the judge as he determined her sentence. She
could have potentially faced five years in prison.
As
part of her sentence, Johnson will take part in a six-month treatment course
for drug and alcohol abuse when she leaves jail.
In
court on Wednesday, Johnson said she has learned from he actions and is
prepared to move forward.
"Time cannot be
reversed nor choices taken back once made," she told the judge, as
quoted by the AP. "I will not be making
this mistake twice."
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