Iowa City man sentenced to 50 years for attempted murder of ex-girlfriend, 3 kids in arson

IOWA CITY — An Iowa City man was sentenced Friday to 50 years in prison for attempting to kill his former girlfriend, her boyfriend and three children in 2021 by pouring lighter fluid under her apartment door and igniting a fire, trapping them inside.

Ishmael S. Carter, 32, was found guilty in January of first-degree arson and five counts of attempted murder. Jurors deliberated more than four hours following the three-day trial, according to court documents.

Sixth Judicial District Judge Valerie Clay ran the five convictions of attempted murder — each are 25 years in prison — concurrently for a total of 25 years. She then ran those 25 years consecutively to 25 years for arson — for a prison term of 50 years.

Carter will have to serve 50 percent of the arson conviction and 70 percent of the attempted murder conviction before being eligible for parole.

Chadsitty Brown first reported to police that her ex-boyfriend, Carter, was outside her apartment at 612 E. Court St., knocking on her door for about 20 minutes on June 13, 2021. She spied Carter through the peephole as he was lying on the floor in front of her door.

During the call, she told a dispatcher the knocking stopped and she thought he had left. She called back at 11:14 p.m. and reported her apartment was on fire.

Brown said that after she thought Carter had left, she heard what sounded like water being poured underneath her upper-level apartment door, according to court documents. It was lighter fluid, which started a blaze that trapped her, her boyfriend, Corey Peterson, and her three children, all under the age of 5, inside the apartment.

Police said Brown and the others went onto the apartment’s balcony until the Iowa City Fire Department extinguished the fire. No one was injured, but the fire caused an estimated $50,000 in damage, according to police.

A criminal complaint and search warrant affidavit said police found Carter watching the fire from a nearby driveway, and witnesses saw him inside the apartment building and outside the building before the fire.

Carter denied he had been at the apartment or started the fire, according to the affidavit. He said he just woke up and went out on his porch at 313 S. Dodge St. to smoke a cigarette. He then saw lights and heard sirens, so he walked over to Court Street and saw the fire.

Carter had a lighter in his pocket and was wearing an ankle monitor, according to the affidavit. He told officers his ankle monitor was “dead,” and he received a call saying he needed to return home and charge it.

Carter was on probation for a 2020 conviction of third-degree sexual abuse and was required to wear a GPS monitor, according to court documents.

Later that night police found a bottle of lighter fluid in the dumpster behind the Court Street apartment. A surveillance video was taken from L & M Mighty Shop, which is two blocks from Carter’s and Brown’s residences. It showed Carter entered the shop about 11:05 p.m., and a clerk helped him find lighter fluid. Carter paid for it, left and was opening it with his mouth. This video was shown to the jury during trial.

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