‘I need protection’ — Richfield woman speaks out after ex-husband allegedly tried to burn down her home with children inside

RICHFIELD, Utah (ABC4) — The victim in an arson case where a man allegedly tried to set his ex-wife’s house on fire is speaking out about the experience of what it’s like to be a victim of domestic violence.

A 38-year-old Richfield man is facing 20 charges after four separate incidents in less than a month where he allegedly tried to set his ex-wife’s house on fire. He’s been arrested on suspicion of multiple counts of aggravated arson, aggravated assault, attempted murder, and other charges.

His ex-wife and the victim in this case, Katey Barney, spoke to ABC4 about the ‘awful’ experience.

“We were trying to work things out,” Katey said, referring to her ex-husband. “We have a child together, and it just wasn’t working out, and so we had split up in July, and he wasn’t happy with that fact.”

Katey said that “some crazy things” happened, and her ex-husband kept escalating, enough so that a judge granted Katey a protective order.

The first fire happened on September 11. Katey got up that morning and went to work, completely unaware until she checked her message requests on social media and saw one from her neighbor.

“She had messaged me at 1:38 in the morning and said, ‘something in your backyard is on fire,'” Katey recalled. Katey didn’t see it because she was sleeping, but that neighbor stayed up the rest of the night to make sure something else didn’t happen.

After she saw the message, Katey left work. “When I got home, there was a huge burn circle and a perfect trail going up to the side of my house that had burned the side of my house a little bit. Obviously, that was very abnormal.”

Katey called the police, who began investigating, and then four days later, she was woken up in the middle of the night.

“I got woke up at 1:20 in the morning to a loud bang, and then some like scuffling noises, and I jumped out of bed, and I ran into my bathroom because that’s where I heard the noise, and the first thing I could smell was gas, and then I smelled smoke.”

She ran out and called 911, and by the time first responders arrived, the fire had died down. The damage was mostly on the exterior of the home.

After the second incident, Katey said she installed cameras all over around the outside of the house. The cameras captured a person jumping over the fence and approaching the bathroom window–where the fire was set previously.

“They just kind of looked in the bathroom window and then looked in the yard and then hopped back over the fence and left,” she described.

Katey called the police, and they stayed the rest of the night. “I kept telling them, I was like, something bad is going to happen. Like, you guys, I know this is hard to figure out, but I need protection. I’m scared. My house is being lit on fire. My kids were in the home all three times. There’s children in here. It’s scary,” she said.

Katey told police that she recognized the suspect’s walk as belonging to her ex-husband, according to court documents.

After that, she said it was quiet for a few weeks, until Sunday morning. “At 2:30 in the morning, a molotov cocktail was thrown through my bedroom window and it lit my house on fire and my room on fire.”

She called 911 again, and firefighters were able to put the fire out. Katey said that she’s very thankful for the hard work the police have done to collect evidence and make an arrest, and then she became emotional.

“I’m just happy they were able to– I know arson cases are really hard to solve sometimes, but I’m glad that they were able to get enough to make an arrest, and I can rest solidly easier knowing that it’s not going to happen anymore… It’s awful.”

Police identified footprints at the scene after several of the incidents, and they found shoes in the suspect’s residence that matched the shoe size and print recovered at the crime scene. He was booked into the Sevier County Jail, where he is being held without bail.