Alabama man sentenced after setting fire to father’s home that killed family pets

INDIANAPOLIS — A 34-year-old man from Birmingham, Alabama has been sentenced to a little more than four years in prison after he set fire to his father’s home in Connersville that killed two of the family’s pets.

According to a news release from the United States Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Indiana, Tommy Lee Harrison Sr. was sentenced to 57 months in federal prison, followed by two years of supervised release. This comes after Harrison pleaded guilty to crossing state lines to commit arson.

On Oct. 28, 2021, the release said that Harrison left Birmingham, Alabama to travel to Connersville to set fire to his father’s home, who lived there with his wife, children and the family’s pets. During the drive, officials said that Harrison stopped at a Kentucky Walmart location to purchase a can of black spray paint.

When Harrison arrived to the Connersville home in the early morning hours of Oct. 29, 2021, the release said that Harrison used gasoline to light the inside and the outside of his father’s home on fire, which killed his father’s family’s cat and dog.

After setting the home on fire, Harrison also used the spray paint he purchased in Kentucky to write a racial slur on the house. Harrison left the scene and returned to Alabama, where he was later arrested.

“This defendant’s actions had a devastating impact not only on the immediate victims, but on the community of Connersville as well. His actions uprooted a family, destroyed their peace of mind and shook the small town in which his father was a prominent community leader,” Zachary A. Myers, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Indiana, said in the release. “Crossing state lines to commit a violent crime is a serious offense that merits a serious federal prison sentence.”

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