A businessman convicted of setting his food truck ablaze in Kearny Mesa in order to collect hundreds of thousands of dollars in insurance money and charitable donations was sentenced Wednesday to five years and four months in state prison.
Avonte Hartsfield, 27, was found guilty by a San Diego jury last month of setting his Rollin Roots food truck on fire on Oct. 3, 2021, then claiming the fire was part of a series of hate crimes perpetrated against him.
Hartsfield raised around $100,000 through a GoFundMe campaign, received more than $235,000 from his insurance company, and accepted a $20,000 donation from the Sycuan Band of the Kumeyaay Nation shortly after the fire.
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He represented himself during the trial and maintained that he had nothing to do with the fire and was at home when the blaze broke out. Incriminating statements he made during a phone conversation with a San Diego police detective were the result of a coerced and false confession, he claimed.
At his sentencing hearing, Hartsfield said he planned to appeal the convictions.
"I do understand that the prosecution and the court would like to see an acceptance of responsibility. However, still, I am denying the fact that I was even there," Hartsfield said.
In arguing for the five-year, four-month maximum term, Deputy District Attorney Judy Taschner said Hartsfield had not shown remorse or taken responsibility to date, and continued to claim others had a hand in the fire.
"There's nobody in this case to blame but himself," the prosecutor said.
Taschner also reproached Hartsfield for using "a false narrative" to play on the sympathies of donors.
"The defendant preyed on the San Diego community, on the good-natured spirit, on the good hearts that our community has," she said.
Hartsfield told police that in the days leading up to the fire, his truck and office had been broken into multiple times and some of his equipment had been vandalized. He also said he found a makeshift noose hanging in his office.
Taschner told jurors that surveillance footage from a business near Hartsfield's office placed him at the scene just before the fire broke out.
The food truck is not visible in the footage, but a man police say was Hartsfield is seen walking in the direction of the truck. A short time later, the same man walks back the way he came and flickering lights can be seen from the area where the truck was parked.
A car resembling Hartsfield's personal vehicle can be seen arriving at the scene and leaving soon after the time of the fire, prosecutors said.
In phone conversations with SDPD detective John Clayton, Hartsfield's account of how the fire started changed several times. He initially told police he had parked the truck outside his office on the night of the fire, went home, then found the truck burned down the following day.
After Clayton stated that Hartsfield was spotted on surveillance footage, Hartsfield explained that he had gone back to the office to check on things due to recent break-ins, but didn't see anyone there and left before the fire began.
Hartsfield later revised this account, telling Clayton that while there, a man armed with a gun threatened him, prompting him to run and head home.
After Clayton told him that he didn't believe the gunman story, Hartsfield said the fire was actually started by a rice cooker he left on in the truck. When the rice cooker sparked the fire, Hartsfield said he panicked and left.
When asked why he didn't initially explain about the rice cooker, Hartsfield said the people who had been targeting his business would have set the truck ablaze at some point regardless, but he'd hoped the truck fire might spur police to investigate the break-ins and other incidents he said actually occurred.
Taschner told jurors that a fire investigation determined the fire could not have been started by the rice cooker as described. She also said Hartsfield made a series of internet searches leading up to the fire that included car explosions and other searches involving burning items.
