[B]URLINGTON — A 70-year-old father who gave a statement to authorities implicating his son in a fatal blaze in Northfield two years ago has been sentenced to more than a year in a federal prison on a charge of conspiring to deal crack cocaine.
After Tuesday’s sentencing, Richard “Dickie” Hoisington of Berlin will now be joining his son, Howard “Howie” Hoisington, 34, behind prison walls.
The younger Hoisington was sentenced last month to 24 years in jail for his role in that fire that killed Brittany Burt and severely injured injured Efren Serrano in December 2015.
The elder Hoisington argued Tuesday for a sentence that would keep him from having to serve time in prison, instead, asking federal Judge Christina Reiss to impose 12 months of house arrest to be served at his mobile home in Berlin.
However, Reiss said during the sentencing hearing in federal court in Burlington that despite the many medical conditions Richard Hoisington is battling, time behind bars was warranted.
She ordered him to serve 13 months in prison, followed by 12 months of house arrest. He had earlier pleaded guilty to a charge of conspiracy to distribute crack cocaine between 2013 and October 2016.
Attorney Mary Kehoe, representing the older Hoisington, said moments earlier that incarceration for her client would amount to a “death sentence” given his failing health, which includes several life-threatening kidney, heart and lung conditions.
“There is no question Mr. Hoisington is a seriously ill man,” she said, later adding, “He does feel that incarceration will be the end of his life.”
She said he is now “completely disabled,” lives alone and is “effectively” housebound, though he does go to the hospital three times a week to receive dialysis treatments.
Richard Hoisington, appearing to labor with his breathing as he addressed the judge, echoed those comments.
“I don’t want to die in a jail cell,” he said.
Longer sentence sought
Prosecutors, however, had been seeking an even longer sentence of at least 24 months behind bars.
Assistant U.S. Attorney John Bocia, one of the prosecutors of the case, said that the federal Bureau of Prisons had medical facilities to care for inmates, including one at Fort Devens, Massachusetts.
He argued that the 24-month prison sentence was warranted given the level of drug dealing that Richard Hoisington had engaged in, saying that the offense involved at least 567 grams of crack cocaine.
“Over the course of the years-long drug distribution conspiracy, the Hoisington residence served as a way-station for various out-of-state drug suppliers,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. “These drug suppliers typically stayed at the Hoisington residence in a rotating fashion, leading to continuous drug-dealing.”
Bocia added while the elder Hoisington wasn’t directly involved in the fire, all the drug activity going on at his home played a leading role.
“The Hoisington residence also brought together the participants in the robbery conspiracy that led to the Northfield arson and the fire that tragically claimed the life of Brittany Burt and severely injured Efren Serrano,” the sentencing memo stated.
That drug dealing, Bocia added, had been going on for some time.
“(Richard) Hoisington’s criminal involvement with drugs, particularly crack cocaine, lasted 35 years and brought drug addiction and violence to his family, his community and the state of Vermont,” the memorandum from prosecutors stated.
The judge, in handing down her sentence Tuesday, said she was particularly concerned that the elder Hoisington continued to deal drugs from his mobile home after providing a statement to police laying out his son’s role in the drug-fueled robbery and fatal fire in Northfield.
Drug dealing continued
“Even after all the tragedy in Northfield,” the judge said, the drug dealing “continued unabated.”
Reiss spoke about how he allowed out-of-state drug dealers to stay at this mobile home and sell crack cocaine to Vermonters, as well as his role in directly dealing the drugs to others.
She also took aim at a statement he gave before his sentencing when he said that the reason he allowed the drug dealing to go on in the residence was because he was the type of person who wanted to go along and avoid confrontations with others.
Reiss said she was “disappointed” upon hearing his words, telling him that based on statements from others he was more than a bystander.
“You were drug dealing,” she told him.
And, while he didn’t play a role in setting the blaze himself and she credited him for providing a statement against his son who did, she added that should have been a turning point for him.
Instead, the judge said, he dealt drugs. “It did not stop,” she added.
Reiss did give Hoisington until July 31 to report to the federal Bureau of Prisons to beginning serving his sentence. She also recommended that the sentence be served as the Fort Devens facility.
Kehoe, Richard Hoisington’s attorney, in her sentencing memo described her client as a growing up in a home with no running water or toilet.
He became a hard worker, eventually becoming a manager at a ski resort. However, in the early 1980s he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis and shortly after lost his job because of his inability to work long hours during the ski season, the memo stated.
That’s when he started using cocaine, saying it “gave him enough energy to go through his day,” Kehoe wrote in the document.
“Mr. Hoisington has been cooperative throughout this criminal process,” the defense attorney wrote, adding that he repeatedly provided statements to prosecutors.
‘Importantly,” she wrote, he was not involved in the charges involving the fatal fire. “He knew nothing about the plan or the act until he learned of it after-the-fact,” she continued. “When he did learn of the fatality, he brought it to the attention of law enforcement.”
Richard Hoisington’s son, Howard Hoisington, formerly of Berlin, received his 24-year sentence on May 31 on charges of arson with death resulting and conspiracy to commit robbery stemming from the fire in Northfield in December 2015.
Fire grew out of robbery tactics
Prosecutors say that, according to court records and testimony at that sentencing hearing, in the fall of 2015, Howard Hoisington, Jonathan Zampieri, Tammy Wilder, Kevin Atwood and Kim Hoisington committed a series of robberies of drug dealers in the Washington County area.
In some cases, prosecutors say, those robberies involved a scheme of dousing with gasoline people selling drugs and threatening them with a lighter to rob them of their drugs.
The last of these robberies, prosecutors said, “resulted in a fire that destroyed a building in Northfield and killed innocent bystander Brittany Burt.”
It was Dec. 14, 2015, that Howard Hoisington, Zampieri, Tammy Wilder, Kim Hoisington and Amanda Wilder drove in Zampieri’s vehicle to pick up Atwood in Montpelier, prosecutors said.
“They all drove then drove to Cumberland Farms in Northfield where Zampieri filled two mason jars with gasoline,” prosecutors said in statement following Howard Hoisington’s sentencing.
“From there, the group drove to the apartment of Efren Serrano on Union Street in Northfield, Vermont, from whom they had arranged to purchase crack cocaine.”
Zampieri, Howard Hoisington, and Atwood then went to Serrano’s apartment and kicked in the front door, the statement added.
Inside, prosecutors say, the group found Serrano and Serrano’s girlfriend, Brittany Burt, in the bedroom.
“Serrano and Burt were doused with gasoline and the men demanded Serrano’s drugs. When Serrano did not respond, Zampieri pulled out a lighter,” the statement from prosecutors read.
“The lighter went off, igniting the gasoline vapors and causing the room to burst into flames,” the statement added. ”Zampieri, Howard Hoisington, and Atwood fled the building. At some point, Serrano was able to run from the building on fire. Serrano sustained life threatening injuries, but he survived. Brittany Burt could not escape the building. She died on the bedroom floor.”
Co-defendants in the case, including Jonathan Zampieri, Tammy Wilder and Kim Hoisington, have all pleaded guilty to various charges and are awaiting sentencing, according to prosecutors.
Atwood died of an apparent suicide in 2016 while incarcerated.
Howard Hoisington has already filed a notice that he intends to appeal his 24-year prison term.
Cristina Burt, Brittany Burt’s mother, attended the sentencing hearing for the elder Hoisington Tuesday.
She said after the hearing that she was pleased with the sentence, and was concerned that he wouldn’t get any time behind bars.
She said she didn’t believe Richard Hoisington’s health was as dire as portrayed in the courtroom, saying she has seen him around town and eating out at restaurants.
When he spoke briefly inside the courtroom, Richard Hoisington did address Cristina Burt.
“I think that’s a horrible thing,” he said of the fire that claimed her daughter’s life. “My condolences.”
