A man who set his Woodville, Wis., bar on fire and then took a $500,000 payout from his insurance company was sentenced Tuesday in St. Croix County Circuit Court to 18 years in prison, authorities said.
Wisconsin man who burned his bar, collected insurance gets 18 years in prison
Kevin Grant was convicted of arson and other felonies for the 2018 fire.
May 3, 2023 at 5:45PM
Kevin Grant, 71, was convicted of arson and other felonies for the Dec. 29, 2018, fire that severely damaged his Cubby Hole Bar and restaurant. He was also ordered by Judge Scott R. Needham to pay a $10,000 fine and restitution to be determined at a later date.
Grant had tried to sell the bar for years, according to the St. Paul Field Division of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. In the months leading up to the fire, Grant also recorded his own phone calls with friends, family and law enforcement in which he talked about electrical issues at the bar and "that people were out to get him," according to the ATF. Days before the fire, Grant filmed a video of the Cubby Hole for insurance purposes, and it showed him stacking incendiary material at the spot where the fire started.
After firefighters from the United Volunteer Fire Department detected an odor of gasoline at the blaze, they asked the ATF and the Wisconsin Department of Criminal Investigation's State Fire Marshal's Office to investigate. Investigators found evidence of a trail of gasoline from the origin of the fire to a pile of plastic tables Grant had moved days before the fire.
After an eight-day trial, jurors deliberated for three hours before returning guilty verdicts.
"Grant tried to explain the incriminating evidence by testifying in his own defense," St. Croix County District Attorney Karl Anderson said in a statement. "But his testimony fell apart during cross-examination, with major inconsistencies with his version of events."
The governor said it may be 2027 or 2028 by the time the market catches up to demand.
