YOUNGSTOWN — Matthew B. Alexander’s wife, Lea, told Judge Anthony D’Apolito Thursday that Alexander is a “decent, kind and loving person.”

But D’Apolito said such a person does not do what the judge saw Alexander do on home security video: light a fire that could have killed three people.

Alexander was convicted at trial in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court in May of two counts of aggravated arson and one count of breaking and entering. The judge sentenced him to 10 to 14 years in prison Thursday for the Sept. 9, 2020, fire he and a co-defendant set at a home on Beverly Avenue in Austintown.

Prosecutors said Alexander, 35, and Ashley Levin, 37, went to the home with a man they met at an Austintown bar, who they gave $100, and who directed them to the house — where he said they could obtain illegal drugs. But the man went to the door of the home, spoke with someone, then disappeared.

A woman and her two children were home, and they had nothing to do with the drug trade. But Levin went to the door and spoke to a woman, who had called 911 and then watched as Levin went into her carport.

The resident could see the carport on her surveillance cameras as Levin emptied a gasoline can on the gas grill in the carport. Levin could be seen “touching the control panel” on the grill, county Assistant Prosecutor Jennifer Paris said.

Then Alexander appeared on the video, walking into the carport and bending over the controls on the gas grill, Paris said.

“The evidence will show, Miss Levin, Ashley, will testify that (Alexander) pushes the ignition button three times. She hears it click three times.” Paris said the gasoline fumes “combust almost immediately. The carport is engulfed, and they run.”

Levin took a plea and testified at Alexander’s trial and got a two-year prison sentence.

Prosecutors asked the judge Thursday to sentence Alexander to 16 years in prison. His attorney asked that Alexander get three years — similar to Levin.

After a discussion of the case among the judge and attorneys, the judge announced the sentence, saying he saw the key evidence. That evidence was the security video showing Alexander, formerly of Youngstown, and Levin, of Austintown, both trying to set the fire, which burned the carport but did not injure anyone. Firefighters arrived quickly and extinguished the flames.

“The evidence to me that was convincing is, I saw you go to the grill (in the car port). I saw you fooling with the grill, and I saw the grill explode,” the judge said. “Your decision that was poor was getting involved at that point.”

He said Alexander’s decision to go looking for drugs or trying to “seek your own justice from a person who stole from you” were much less important than Alexander seeing Levin pour gasoline on a gas grill and children’s toys in the carport and then setting the fire.

The judge said the video contradicts “the picture that is being painted about you that you are a good person.”

He said what Alexander did “absolutely created a substantial risk of serious physical harm. I don’t think you lit that trying to kill — like pointing a gun at someone.” But when someone lights something like gasoline “by lighter, by match … you can’t be surprised if the whole place goes up in flames.”

He said Alexander knew people were in the house, so “you can’t be surprised if someone gets hurt or dies.”

erunyan@vindy.com