'Red hot' boasts of £7m store arsonist

Career shoplifter Karen Thompson started the blaze which razed a Matalan store to the ground causing 7m damage.

Six hours later the 27-year-old posted a message on the social networking site Facebook which read: "Got 2 go 2 Matalan tomorrow girlz, theres rails ov red hot bargains."

She went on to say "carnt believe Matalan has been burnt down" and she liked a group which had been set up called "RIP Matalan."

The blaze, tackled by 40 firefighters at its height, gutted the store in Grimsby and forced 50 staff to relocate.

Thompson, who lived at the YMCA, in Grimsby, admitted committing arson at the store on June 6.

She has 17 previous convictions for 57 offences, most of them shoplifting and burglary to feed her drug habit.

Thompson had tried to burn a security tag off an item of clothing with a cigarette lighter – a method favoured by "professional" shoplifters – but it went disastrously wrong.

CCTV pictures played to Grimsby Crown Court showed her stealing the goods, putting her hand to her mouth when she realised what had happened and then thick, white smoke filling the aisles.

When the fire alarm sounded she panicked, joining other customers in the car park.

Andrew Bailey, defending, said Thompson had not intended to deliberately cause the blaze and it was a case of "shoplifting gone wrong."

At the time Thompson was subject to a suspended jail sentence for stealing 136 of clothes from Marks & Spencer and obstructing a police officer.

Thompson was jailed for 40 months for the arson and another three weeks consecutively for the breach of the suspended sentence.