Santa Rosa woman sentenced in Molotov cocktail attack on neighbor

A 50-year-old Santa Rosa woman who threw a Molotov cocktail through a neighbor's window in a dispute over $2 was sentenced Friday to 10 years in prison.

Seria Taylor was arrested Nov. 4 after the incident on Ware Avenue near the Sonoma County Fairgrounds.

Witnesses said she drove up to the house, hopped out of the car and tossed a flaming bottle of gasoline through the large, plate-glass window.

It was extinguished before firefighters arrived but caused more than $7,000 in damage. Taylor was arrested the same day.

Her husband, Paul Taylor, told Judge Ken Gnoss Friday that his wife was a drug addict who was in a monetary dispute with the victim.

"It was all over $2," he told the judge.

Probation Department officials recommended she serve 16 years in prison for arson of an inhabited dwelling. Instead, Gnoss gave her a decade behind bars and ordered her to pay restitution to the victim.

Taylor had previously been found mentally incompetent and was treated for five months at Napa State Hospital.