California Hotel Owner Sentenced for Soliciting Arson

The owner of a downtown Oakland residential hotel has been sentenced to prison for hiring someone to try to burn down the hotel.

Federal prosecutors say Richard Earl Singer was sentenced to 27 months in prison Wednesday after he pleaded guilty in June to solicitation to commit arson.

Singer was the owner of the Hotel Menlo, a residential hotel in downtown Oakland.

Prosecutors say he wrote a check for $1,500 for the materials to set the fire, while agreeing to pay $65,000 once the building was burned down.

Besides being sentenced to prison, the 45-year-old Singer was also ordered to pay a $60,000 fine. He’ll also have to serve three years of supervised released once he’s released from prison.