Kansas Arsonist Gets 36 Years for Deadly Blaze

A Topeka, Kan., man has been sentenced to more than 36 years in prison for setting a fire that killed a blind woman.

The Topeka Capital-Journal reported that 34-year-old Frank Jerome Robinson tearfully denied setting the blaze before the sentence was imposed Aug. 30 in Shawnee County District Court.

Robinson said the allegations against him were false and that “some stuff” had been swept under the rug.

Jurors convicted him in August 2009 of second-degree murder and aggravated arson in the 2006 apartment house blaze that killed 53-year-old Marvina Lee Washington.

As part of his sentence, Robinson also was ordered to pay $2,500 in lawyer’s fees and about $3,200 to the Kansas Crime Victims Reparations Board for Washington’s funeral.