Police dog tracks arsonist watching across road

A 60-year-old Hastings man set fire to a wheelie bin outside a childcare centre in Clive before walking across the road to a takeaway store and sitting down to watch events unfold.

Trevor Raymond Harold Riding, a sickness beneficiary, appeared in the Napier District Court yesterday and admitted setting fire to the bin.

The court heard that between 9.15pm and 9.25pm on March 6 Riding was sitting outside the Halfway House Takeaway shop in Main Rd, Clive.

He had crossed the road to Chuckles Learning Centre and gone up the driveway to the side of the building where there was a plastic wheelie bin.

He had set fire to rubbish in the bin, which was about half a metre from the building, before leaving the scene and walking back across the road to his table outside the takeaway store.

A short time later emergency services had arrived and extinguished the fire.

A police dog was able to track from the scene to Riding across the road, who refused to comment when spoken to by police.

The building suffered minor smoke damage and the wheelie bin was destroyed.

Judge Tony Adeane remanded Riding in custody to reappear in court for sentencing next month.