Two men jailed for arson attacks on property linked to Keir Starmer

Roman Lavrynovych and Stanislav Carpiuc imprisoned for seven years and two years respectively

Roman Lavrynovych and Stanislav Carpiuc have been jailed at the Old Bailey for seven years and two years respectively for arson attacks on property connected to Keir Starmer .

Lavrynovych, 22, from Ukraine, and Carpiuc, 27, from Romania were found guilty on Monday of conspiring to commit arson on a car and two properties linked to the prime minister.

During the trial, the jury heard that an anonymous Russian-speaking figure named El Money recruited Lavrynovych and Carpiuc on Telegram. The mysterious contact offered Lavrynovych payment to set the fires, record them and get them on the news.

On Monday, Lavrynovych was also convicted of damaging two properties by fire, being reckless as to whether life was endangered. Another Ukrainian man, Petro Pochynok, 35, was acquitted.

On 8 May 2025, a Toyota Rav4, once owned by Starmer, was set ablaze. A second fire was set on 11 May, at the front door of a property in north London that Starmer had previously managed. In the early hours of 12 May, a fire broke out at Starmer’s former home in Kentish Town, where his sister-in-law and her family were then living.

In mitigation for Lavrynovych, his lawyer James Scobie KC described him as “utterly naive, utterly gullible, unthinking” and a “complete and utter footsoldier”.

“How worrying that is for us all that there are individuals like this who are fodder for this type of infiltration,” he said.

Scobie told the court about the shame felt by Lavrynovych’s family in Ukraine for his actions. “This is national. He’s got to go back to that one day. He’s going back to a country who is at war and, unwittingly or otherwise, he hasn’t been on their side. That is very real.”