Homeless Man Is “Completely Gutted”

An arson attack by two 13 year old boys on a derelict bingo hall has resulted in a homeless man losing everything.

Giles Gosling, who lost his job and home during the pandemic, set up a tent behind the former Gala Bingo site in in Kettering in Northamptonshire. On Sunday night, a blaze took hold of the building before spreading to a nearby electricity sub-station, knocking out the power to several homes in the town. As a result of this, the homeless man’s belongings were totally destroyed.

Mr Gosling said: “I am gutted, completely gutted. All the possessions I had were in that tent and it’s all gone. I’d been sleeping in doorways and moving around a lot since I lost my job and all my money and to be honest, I had got used to travelling light because I was always moving around looking for work.

He continued: “But when I came to Kettering, it was the one place where I really did start to feel settled because the people here are really sound and I did really like it here. I’d got my tent – a good tent that I could stand up in – and I had a few things to make it feel a bit more homely, like I had bedding in there. I’d even met a new girlfriend recently. Thank God she wasn’t in there at the time.”

Not The First Time The Building Has Been In The Papers!

Reliving the moment he realised he had lost everything – again, he told local media:“I’d nipped out for an hour or two just for a bit of a walk around and I was talking to one of the other homeless lads who lives in the bus stop and as I was walking back up I saw all the smoke…

…and I knew it was where my tent was. I thought something must have gone wrong but there’s nothing round here that could go up like that. I started running back up the road and could hear the fire engines coming up the road. It was too late though, it had all gone.”

A police cordon was erected around the building until fire investigators were done with analysing the evidence. Some time later, two 13 year old boys were arrested and held in police custody.

The former Gala Bingo venue hit the headlines shortly after closing its doors for good in 2018 when a huge cannabis factory was discovered within. That same year the building was bought by London-based Nagrecha Brothers Limited for £570,000.

Fast forward to January 2023, and the locals have no idea what the “asset of community value” building will become. Vice-chairman of North Northamptonshire Council said: “It would be amazing to renovate it and turn it into a community use building but the reality is we just don’t have the money and it would be too big a job.”

Source: “Homeless Man Lost Everything He Owned In Kettering Arson Attack As Tow Boys Aged 13 Arrested”, itv.com, April 11, 2023.