Ex-BLM firefighter sentenced for arson

SALMON, Idaho – A former federal firefighter who confessed to lighting blazes for “the thrill of it” and to boost his pay was sentenced in 7th District Court in central Idaho to up to 10 years in prison.

Levi Miller, 22, will first undergo a mental evaluation and spend six months in a minimum-security prison. Depending on his performance in the evaluation and at the state prison in Cottonwood, Miller could face between two and 10 years behind bars, Judge James Herndon said.

Miller pleaded guilty in separate hearings in September and October to lighting blazes near the central Idaho mountain town of Salmon, first in 2003 and again this year on Aug. 13.

In 2003, he set two fires on public land while with the North Fork Volunteer Fire Department. And in August, he said he paid a teen to light a brush fire on the outskirts of Salmon, where he was being paid hourly by the federal Bureau of Land Management to fight wildfires in the region.

After that fire, Miller and two other firefighters for the 10-member BLM crew in Salmon were fired.

At Tuesday’s sentencing hearing, Herndon asked him why he set the fires.

“I was stupid, immature,” Miller replied.

“And for the thrill of it?” Herndon asked.

“That, too, your honor,” Miller said.

Miller is among several firefighters who recently have been involved in court cases stemming from arson-caused blazes.

Earlier this month, a former volunteer firefighter in Michigan acknowledged setting several blazes, including two at the house of her mother, the fire chief.

On Oct. 31, a fire manager with the U.S. Forest Service admitted igniting timber in the Coconino National Forest in Arizona in 2004. A fire chief and four volunteer firefighters in rural Tennessee also have been charged with torching vacant buildings in 10 arson fires over the past two years, while a judge in July sentenced a Forest Service firefighter to four months in prison for lighting three fires on federal lands in California in 2004.

Miller faced a maximum 10-year sentence for each of the 2003 fires, as well as up to life in prison for solicitation of arson for financial gain in the August blaze. Prosecutors still are seeking $31,000 in restitution for property damages and labor costs. Another hearing is set for December.

“I just want this opportunity to apologize for my actions,” Miller said in court Tuesday while sobbing and asking his family – and his former fire bosses – to forgive him.