FORMER pub landlord Keith Willoughby has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for the manslaughter of taxi driver Derek Drury and the fire which destroyed the Old Locomotive in Canterbury.

Willoughby, 53, of Wincheap, Canterbury, had been convicted of arson and manslaughter in December.

The jury at Maidstone Crown Court had heard how the debt-ridden publican planned to burn down the building and collect the insurance money.

Willoughby enlisted the help of Mr Drury, but the plot tragically backfired when the 40-year-old from Whitstable was killed in the explosion on the night of August 11, 2002.

Sentencing him Judge Warwick McKinnon said: “It was an obvious and greedy endeavour to rid yourself of a deterioriating and oppressive financial difficulty.”

No order was made about the confiscation of £200,000 Willoughby received from the sale of the Old Locomotive site in Station Road West, Canterbury.

He will have to pay costs of £9,774. The judge ordered that Willoughby serve at least two-thirds of his jail term.