JACKSON COUNTY, MI – A woman who admitted to dropping an incendiary device on a man’s home is wanted by police after she failed to appear in court for sentencing.
A judge issued a bench warrant for Sandelia Lee Irvin on Sept. 19 after the Probation Department notified the court of Irvin’s disappearance, according to court records.
Irvin, 25, was free on bail and scheduled to be sentenced on September 19th on various felonies related to the incendiary bombing.
Instead, a Probation Department official attended the hearing and informed the court that the office had discovered that Mr. Irvin had severed his GPS tether the previous night, September 18, at approximately 10:45 p.m. This is shown in court records.
Irvin’s whereabouts were unknown as of Thursday and he was wanted on charges of failure to appear in court and violating bond conditions.
She admitted to second-degree arson and manufacturing explosives in May, three months after authorities arrested her for throwing lit Molotov cocktails into her home and a parked car in her driveway, according to court records. .
Related article: Detroit woman charged in incendiary bombing of Jackson County home pleads guilty
In return, the prosecutor’s office reduced the first-degree arson charge, which carries a possible life sentence, to second-degree arson, and charges of possession of an explosive Molotov cocktail, fourth-degree arson, and tampering with a witness in a separate case at sentencing. I agreed to dismiss it. Records show it is related to arson.
Irvin had waived his right to a preliminary examination and was scheduled to go to trial.
The incident stems from a fire reported at 2:18 a.m. on Feb. 27 in the 200 block of Bayport Circle. The homeowner suffered minor injuries when his clothes caught fire while trying to put out the fire, according to the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office, which conducted the investigation.
Police said Irvin fled the scene before officers arrived. However, investigators were able to identify her as a suspect and track her as she entered and exited the area at the time of the fire using a Flock license plate reader camera, police said.
Cameras are installed along public roads throughout the county. These are unsupervised and live video recordings. Instead, they take a single photo of the back of the car and capture its license plate.
The plates in the photo will be kept for 30 days and checked against a ‘hot list’. This means that if a license number is identified as being involved in a violent crime, police will be alerted to when and where the photo was taken.
Investigators can also check the descriptions of vehicles passing through the area.
When she pleaded guilty, her bail was reduced from $250,000 to $10,000 and she was released from the Jackson County Jail after paying a bond of $5,000.
Anyone with information regarding Irvin’s whereabouts is asked to contact the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office at 517-768-7901.
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