{"id":21346,"date":"2020-02-09T14:11:55","date_gmt":"2020-02-09T21:11:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyhinews.com\/?p=63073"},"modified":"2020-02-09T14:11:55","modified_gmt":"2020-02-09T21:11:55","slug":"man-who-faced-arson-charge-pleads-guilty-to-burn-ordinance-violations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/local-news\/man-who-faced-arson-charge-pleads-guilty-to-burn-ordinance-violations\/","title":{"rendered":"Man who faced arson charge pleads guilty to burn ordinance violations"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
The entrance to Gorewood Estates with a sign reminding residents to make sure they can put out any fires they start.<\/strong>
McKenna Harford \/ mharford@skyhinews.com<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Despite the testimonies of several concerned neighbors and a history of leaving fires unattended, a Grand County judge agreed to a plea agreement for a Silverthorne man who faced an arson charge from earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Christopher Linsmayer, a resident of the Gorewood neighborhood roughly eight miles west of Kremmling and husband of Denver District Attorney Beth McCann, pleaded guilty to two counts of violating the Grand County ordinance regarding burn permits at his sentencing on Monday.<\/p>\n

Previously, Linsmayer faced a fourth degree arson charge for an Aug. 23 incident<\/a> in which he burned a slash pile out of season on his property on a Red Flag warning day. His plea agreement lowered the charges to two county ordinance violations, which are petty offenses.<\/p>\n

He faces roughly $1,500 in fines and must make a $1,000 donation to Mountain Family Center or pay victim restitution. County Court Judge Nicholas Catanzarite accepted the plea agreement.<\/p>\n

However, the August incident isn\u2019t the first time Linsmayer\u2019s burning habits have been concerning. His history with lighting fires in the county goes back to at least 2016, when a 10 acre wildfire, known as the Gore Ridge Fire<\/a>, started on Linsmayer\u2019s property and spread to a neighboring property, causing over $100,000 in damage.<\/p>\n

An investigation of the Gore Ridge Fire revealed that Linsmayer had been burning three or four slash piles that were larger than allowed by ordinance. Linsmayer was not cited for the wildfire, but he did agree to pay Grand County roughly $190,000 for fire suppression efforts and restitution to his neighbor, Henry Meier.<\/p>\n

According to the sheriff\u2019s office, Linsmayer was cited for a county ordinance violation on Nov. 1, 2016<\/a> and other reports of inappropriate burning were filed on April 7, 2017, and on Sept. 16, 2017, but Linsmayer was not cited.<\/p>\n

Due to past events, multiple neighbors spoke in person at Linsmayer\u2019s sentencing or sent in letters requesting the most serious consequences for his actions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe fear for our lives and that of our property because this individual has been allowed to repeatedly commit the same acts of arson with no punishment,\u201d one neighbor\u2019s letter said. \u201cWe do not trust that (Linsmayer) will exercise common sense or follow the law if he gets another slap on the wrist.\u201d<\/p>\n

Prosecutor Kathryn Dowdell also spoke to the community frustration caused by Linsmayer\u2019s actions, but noted she can\u2019t prosecute him for past behavior and hopes the maximum penalties for violating the county burn ordinance would get through to Linsmayer.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know exactly what\u2019s going on with (Linsmayer),\u201d Dowdell told the judge on Monday. \u201cHopefully, this sends the message that (he) will be prosecuted now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Linsmayer\u2019s attorney, Jack DiCola, said his client means well, but has definitely made mistakes in the past.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that he understands that he shouldn\u2019t be doing any more burning up there, hopefully, he does,\u201d DiCola said. \u201cThe people are exacting the maximum penalties under this ordinance and they are also having him make a $1,000 donation, which is not chicken feed.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: Sky-Hi News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The entrance to Gorewood Estates with a sign reminding residents to make sure they can put out any fires they start.McKenna Harford \/ mharford@skyhinews.com Despite the testimonies of several concerned neighbors and a history of leaving fires unattended, a Grand County judge agreed to a plea agreement for a Silverthorne man who faced an arson […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21346","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-18 05:00:00","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KRKY Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21346","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21346"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21346\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21346"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21346"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21346"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}