A Colorado teenager, Kevin Bui, plotted a revenge attack on the wrong home after his iPhone was stolen, resulting in the deaths of a Senegalese family of five in a house fire in 2020. Bui, who was 16 at the time, used the “Find my iPhone” app to track his stolen phone to the Denver neighborhood where the family resided. Described as the ringleader of the plot, Bui and his two friends set the home on fire, resulting in the deaths of Djibril and Adja Diol, along with their two baby daughters, as well as their relative. Three other individuals were injured while trying to escape the inferno.
Surveillance footage showed Bui and his friends wearing masks and hoodies while setting fire to the home. The trio were identified as suspects after authorities obtained IP addresses from Google that had searched for the home’s address around the time of the fire. The teenagers were arrested five months after the incident. One of Bui’s friends, Dillon Siebert, was sentenced to three years in juvenile detention and seven years in a state prison program for young inmates after pleading guilty to second-degree murder. Another friend, Gavin Seymour, received a 40-year prison sentence for his involvement in the crime.
Bui, prosecuted as an adult, pleaded guilty to two counts of second-degree murder as part of a plea deal that could result in a maximum sentence of 60 years in prison, with 30 years for each count. Sixty other charges against Bui, including first-degree murder, attempted murder, arson, and burglary, were dropped under the plea agreement. Bui is scheduled to be sentenced on July 2, where he faces a potential lengthy prison term for his role in the tragic fire that claimed the lives of an innocent family.
