A BLIND pensioner today blasted the sentence handed down to a 12-year-old boy who torched her flat and said: "He has taken ten years off my life."

Evelyn Lucas, 86, told of her ordeal as the youngster who set fire to her bedroom was placed under a three year supervision order by a judge at Preston Crown Court.

Miss Lucas escaped the fire when her neighbour John Roberts burst into the house holding a schoolboy and screaming for her to get out on May 3 last year.

She said: "If it wasn't for my neighbour John I wouldn't be here today.

"Before this happened I was a fairly fit and healthy 86-year-old, now I am an old 87-year-old. This has taken ten years off my life.

"Even my doctor and district nurse used to say how fit I was, but in 10 months I have aged 10 years.

"I am disgusted that he has just been put under supervision. This means he could go and do it again to someone else."

The boy, now aged 13, pleaded guilty to a charge of arson, being reckless as to whether life would be endangered.

The court heard that before the attack Miss Lucas had problems with juveniles throwing stones at her windows.

The fire happened last year when Miss Lucas had dozed off at her ground floor council flat in the Shadsworth area of Blackburn.

She was woken up by the sound of heavy knocking at the door and found the room full of smoke.

She pressed her emergency button and at that moment her neighbour John Roberts burst into the room. Miss Lucas panicked and was taken out by an ambulanceman.

The court was told that the youth initially told police he had not been involved. He later admitted it was him, saying he had smashed a window with a stone and set fire to a net curtain using paper. "I think I just found it funny," he told police.

Amanda Johnson, defending, said the boy had pleaded guilty at the first opportunity and Judge Townend said he would impose a supervision order. He told the youth he had committed a very serious offence and if older he would have served several years in prison.

He added: "This old lady who could not have helped herself could well have been killed.

"Obviously you didn't want that to happen, but you were not really thinking straight, it seems to me."

The judge also said that Miss Lucas's neighbour who rescued her should receive a £500 reward for his heroic actions.