Romanian national Cristian Stefan Topiter already had arson and theft convictions when he broke into the former Belfast Telegraph building, stole electronic equipment and started a fire. The blaze caused £330,000 in damage. Police later found him in a Glasgow immigration detention centre awaiting deportation. He received 11 months in custody and 11 months on licence—then surfaced in Dublin, where another fire burned centuries-old human remains beyond recognition and closed a historic church crypt for almost nine months.
The first arson record
Topiter’s known record did not begin at St Michan’s. When he appeared at Belfast Crown Court in 2019, the court heard that he already had a previous Northern Ireland conviction for arson and two theft convictions in Romania. The available report does not provide dates, facts or sentences for those earlier offences, so this file does not invent them.
His next known offence was extensively documented on CCTV. On 21 February 2018, Topiter entered the historic four-storey former Belfast Telegraph building on Royal Avenue after workers had left. He concealed himself in the first-floor ceiling, fell through it and then spent about four hours roaming the building with a backpack.
The prosecution said he concentrated on a Digital Catapult technology hub, filling his backpack with electronic items. At about 9.30pm, CCTV recorded him starting a deliberate fire with combustible material. He smashed a window and left shortly before 11pm. Firefighters were not alerted until about 3.30 the following morning, after the blaze had burned for hours.
£330,000 destroyed, then an immigration arrest
The fire caused an assessed £279,000 in damage to the building, which was owned by Belfast City Council, and a further £51,000 to Digital Catapult equipment. That produces the reported total of £330,000. The currencies and ownership matter: this was Northern Ireland damage, not an Irish prison or taxpayer figure.
DNA recovered after Topiter cut himself leaving the building matched him. He was later arrested at an immigration detention centre in Glasgow, where the Irish News reported he was awaiting deportation. In May 2019, he pleaded guilty to burglary and arson. The court imposed 11 months in custody followed by another 11 months on supervised licence.
Defence counsel said it was “highly likely” Topiter would be deported after the sentence. That was a defence prediction, not a published removal decision. No located source establishes whether the UK deportation happened, where he went, whether any exclusion applied, or when and on what basis he later came to the Republic of Ireland.
Five years later: fire in St Michan’s crypt
On 11 June 2024, a fire was set in the crypt of St Michan’s Church of Ireland on Church Street, Dublin. The church, built in 1192, held naturally preserved mummified remains, including an 800-year-old body known as the Crusader and other remains preserved for 350 to 400 years.
A tour guide raised the alarm after seeing smoke. At the initial District Court hearing, garda evidence said Topiter had been identified on CCTV behind a locked gate and was arrested nearby. The court was told that he was a Romanian national. He had used different spellings of his first name in reporting—Christian in some early proceedings and Cristian in the final Irish case—but the age, full name and court histories connect the records.
Two mummies were burned beyond recognition. Water needed to extinguish the fire damaged others. That distinction is important: the final sentencing evidence does not say every remain in the crypt was destroyed. It does establish irreversible damage to human remains described in court as “irreplaceable” and “priceless”.
A guilty plea and six-year sentence
In September 2024, the Director of Public Prosecutions authorised an arson charge to replace the original criminal-damage wording. On 13 December, Topiter affirmed a signed guilty plea to committing arson at St Michan’s and damaging the mummified remains by fire.
On 20 February 2025, Judge Martin Nolan imposed a six-year prison sentence and backdated it to 11 June 2024, when Topiter entered custody. The judge described the offence as very serious and treated the relevant previous arson conviction as an aggravating factor.
The defence said Topiter had addiction and longstanding mental-health difficulties, had been drinking heavily and taking tablets, and retained little memory of the incident. Counsel said there was no sinister motive or hostility towards the church. Topiter apologised to the Irish public and said he accepted responsibility.
Judge Nolan accepted the guilty plea and personal circumstances as mitigation but rejected intoxication as any great excuse. The judge said Topiter started the fire for reasons known only to himself and observed that when Topiter was insensible, he appeared to decide to start fires: “That seems to be a particular vice.” The final adjudicated outcome is therefore arson on a guilty plea, with six years’ imprisonment and no suspended portion reported.
A church left in financial crisis
St Michan’s crypt tours had generated between €75,000 and €100,000 a year, income used to maintain the church and vaults. At sentencing, Archdeacon David Pierpoint said the loss of tours had created a financial crisis. He described the fire as an act of desecration and sacrilege and a loss to the parish, Dublin and the nation.
By March 2025, the crypt had been closed for almost nine months. The Archdeacon said the parish had already lost tens of thousands and expected to lose between €75,000 and €100,000 over a year. Plans involved securing an exhumation order, moving desecrated remains to a sealed vault and trying to reopen the surviving attraction.
Those figures are parish revenue, not a State invoice, and they must not be added mechanically to the prison benchmark. Nor can a responsible report assign a fictional monetary value to unique centuries-old human remains.
Chronology
- Before February 2018: Topiter had a Northern Ireland arson conviction and two Romanian theft convictions, according to his later Belfast hearing.
- 21 February 2018: broke into the former Belfast Telegraph building, took electronic equipment and deliberately started a fire.
- Following the Belfast offence: arrested at a Glasgow immigration detention centre while awaiting deportation.
- May 2019: pleaded guilty to burglary and arson; 11 months in custody plus 11 months on supervised licence imposed.
- Post-sentence: defence predicted deportation was highly likely, but no removal outcome was located.
- 11 June 2024: fire set in St Michan’s crypt; Topiter arrested nearby and held in custody.
- 10 September 2024: DPP-authorised arson charge replaced the original criminal-damage charge.
- 13 December 2024: Topiter affirmed his signed guilty plea to arson in Dublin Circuit Criminal Court.
- 20 February 2025: sentenced to six years, backdated to 11 June 2024.
- 2 March 2025: crypt remained closed after almost nine months; parish reported substantial lost income and plans for reinterment and reopening.
Record across three jurisdictions
The minimum supportable record is stark. Before the 2018 Belfast blaze, Topiter already had one arson conviction in Northern Ireland and two theft convictions in Romania. The Belfast case added burglary and arson. At the 2025 Dublin sentencing, the court was also told of convictions for possession of drugs, burglary, theft and common assault.
Not every one of those offences can be assigned a date or jurisdiction from the reports reviewed. The safe conclusion is at least three adjudicated arson offences: the earlier Northern Ireland conviction, the 2018 Belfast fire resolved in 2019, and the 2024 Dublin fire resolved in 2025. The general conviction list is not converted into a guessed total.
Conditional prison benchmark: €594,432
The Irish Prison Service reported a 2024 average cost of €99,072 for an available, staffed prison space, excluding capital expenditure. Multiplying that rate by the six-year Irish sentence gives a conditional nominal illustration of €594,432.
That is not Topiter’s proven bill or time served. The sentence was backdated, remission and release are unknown, annual prison costs vary, and an average staffed-space figure is not marginal spending attributable to one prisoner. The benchmark is conditional on mechanically pricing the full six-year term at the 2024 rate.
The Irish rate is not applied to his Northern Ireland sentence, which belongs to a different prison system. It also excludes PSNI and Garda investigations, Belfast and Dublin fire-service responses, prosecution, courts, legal aid, immigration detention or enforcement, conservation, exhumation, reinterment and restoration. No complete public-cost total was located.
The enforcement question the record cannot answer
The cross-border sequence deserves scrutiny without overstating the evidence. Topiter was found in a UK immigration detention centre awaiting deportation after causing £330,000 damage in Belfast. His lawyer said deportation after custody was highly likely. Five years later, he was in Dublin and committed another arson offence.
The public reports do not reveal whether deportation occurred, whether any UK order restricted travel to Ireland, when Topiter entered the Republic, or whether his presence was lawful under rights available to a Romanian EU citizen. A UK immigration process is not automatically an Irish exclusion order. The responsible conclusion is therefore narrower: the published enforcement trail ends without an outcome, and no official account located for this file explains the transition from Glasgow immigration detention to later residence in Dublin.
Sources
- Irish News final Belfast sentence, Romanian origin, immigration detention and licence.
- Irish News detailed Belfast offence, damage, earlier record and deportation submission.
- RTÉ initial Irish court report and explicit Romanian nationality.
- RTÉ report on substitution of the arson charge.
- Irish Times report on the affirmed guilty plea.
- RTÉ final six-year sentence, prior record, impact and backdating.
- Irish Times final sentencing report.
- Irish Examiner final sentencing report.
- Irish Times crypt closure and parish-loss report.
- Law Society Gazette sentencing summary.
- Irish Prison Service Annual Report 2024 cost benchmark.