Torment continues for father who survived deadly Willenhall arson attack

The 64-year-old father-of-four today tells how he fled the blaze started by arsonist Aiden Elmore as it rapidly ripped through a block of maisonettes.

Even now, more than a year on from the horrors of that night, Mr Ball still suffers flashbacks to the events of that evening which claimed the life of his neighbour Victor Moore, and he can still not face moving back in to the property.

Mr Ball, who had lived at his residence for more than 20 years in Willenhall, today recalls the inferno. He insists culprit Elmore should be locked away forever.

The former water board worker endured a cancer scare and undergone surgery to remove his tonsils since, and he traces his health problems to the trauma of the blaze, which Elmore started at the flats at the junction of Southey Close and Tennyson Road, Willenhall.

He said: "The last 12 months I have been bad, it has all stemmed from the stress of what happened. I have been bad with my nerves. I get flashbacks, I don't think I will ever get over it. I have not been the same since, I never go out at night.

"They should lock him up for good. I hope they throw the keys away."

Residents were trapped as they were barricaded in by bins and Mr Ball leapt from the first floor, where he lived above Mr Moore, who was on the ground floor. He managed to land safely on grass.

Remembering the events of last year, he said: "It was terrible, I was asleep in bed. I just happened to wake up because there was a smell of smoke. When I went in the living room I put the little table light on and all the electric went off.

"I was wondering what was happening, the front door has got four little panes of glass at the top and I looked out and it was like an inferno. Smoke was billowing in and I just jumped out of the bedroom window. It was an inferno, I just had to get out. I jumped out of the bedroom window.

"All I had got on was my slippers, a t-shirt, trainer bottoms and my dressing gown. It happened so fast, about five minutes later the police and fire engines came. Nobody could get out. Victor was the best neighbour, he kept himself to himself."

Mr Ball lost some of his belongings in the fire and now lives elsewhere in Short Heath.

Elmore was convicted of murder following a five-week trial at Wolverhampton Crown Court. He will be sentenced tomorrow and faces life in jail. He started the blaze which killed Mr Moore, 68, who had stepped out of his flat into the heart of the fire. He collapsed and died in the ground-floor corridor.

The jury found 21-year-old Elmore, a self-employed roofer of no fixed address and formerly of Essington Road, New Invention, Willenhall, guilty of murder and two counts of arson with intent to endanger life.