SMOKED OUT! Flatlands arsonist slapped with fi ve-year sentence for setting Kings Plaza inferno
BY CHANDLER KIDD
A Flatlands arsonist will
spend five years behind bars
for setting a massive blaze
that engulfed the parking
garage of Kings Plaza Shopping
Center last year.
Federal Judge I. Leo
Glasser slapped 23-yearold
Evon Stephens with the
lengthy sentence on Sept. 25
for igniting the inferno that
injured 25 people and damaged
over 135 vehicles in the
garage on Avenue U in Mill
Basin, according to prosecutors.
Surveillance video captured
Stephens entering the
parking lot in the early morning
hours of Sept. 17 of last
year, before breaking into a
Mercedes Benz and setting
fi re to the car’s interior, according
to prosecutors.
The blaze soon spread
through the massive parking
structure, leading to a
Evon Stephens will spend fi ve years behind bars for setting fi re to the Kings Plaza shopping center in 2018
Photo by Steve Solomonson
COURIER L 4 IFE, OCT. 4-10, 2019
three hour firefight.
“This crime senselessly
endangered the lives of
FDNY members and the public,
and caused tremendous
property damage,” said Fire
Department Commissioner
Daniel Nigro. “I commend
our Fire Marshals...for
their outstanding investigative
work that led to the apprehension
and sentencing
of this dangerous arsonist.”
Police arrested Stephens
several hours after the fi re began
— when he reportedly told
investigators that he had set
the blaze because he believed
that people used the vacant vehicles
for “sexual activity.”
In the months following
the incident, authorities
discovered that Kings Plaza
had been using the garage to
illegally store unsold cars
on behalf of car dealerships,
which lead prosecutors to
slap the shopping mall with
a measly $1,250 fine.
Stephens pled guilty in
federal court last May to felony
charges of using fire to
damage property.
The arsonist will also be
responsible for coughing
up monetary restitution,
although the exact amount
will be determined by a federal
judge at a later date, according
to prosecutors.
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