Inset: Rashamba Claybrooks (Wisconsin Department of Corrections). Background: The Milwaukee, Wisconsin, apartment building Claybrooks set on fire, resulting in the death of 71-year-old Sam Nash (WDJT).
A 29-year-old Wisconsin woman has been sentenced to more than 20 years in prison after prosecutors said she set fire to her boyfriend’s apartment when he told her to leave, sparking a blaze that killed a 71-year-old resident living two floors above.
Rashamba Claybrooks pleaded guilty to felony murder and arson of a building in connection with the death of Sam Nash, and court records show she received a 24-year prison sentence.
Milwaukee police were first called to the apartment building in the 3000 block of West Capitol Drive shortly before 2:30 p.m. on April 8, 2025, for a reported assault, according to a probable cause arrest affidavit obtained by Law&Crime. As officers headed to the scene, the call was updated to an active fire.
Fire crews extinguished the flames on the building’s west side. Investigators determined the blaze started inside a first-floor apartment, sending smoke upward into the units above.
Police later learned that Nash’s son had discovered his father unresponsive in a third-floor apartment located directly above the unit where the fire began. The son told officers he heard about the fire and went to check on his father. During an initial search he did not see him, but when he looked again, he found Nash wedged between a kitchen table and a wall, with the hood of a sweatshirt covering his face.
Paramedics pronounced Nash dead at the scene. Authorities said he died from smoke inhalation.
Video from the fire showed smoke entering Nash’s window.
Investigators spoke with the domestic violence victim, who said he and Claybrooks were arguing while they were shopping at Walmart. After they got home, she threw something at him, and he told her that she had to move out of the apartment.
Claybrooks took some cardboard and loose paper and set fire to a closet with stacks of clothes in it. She left the apartment, and her boyfriend smelled smoke. He saw fire coming from the closet and ran to the hallway where he grabbed a fire extinguisher to douse the flames. But a little while later, he again smelled smoke. This time the fire in the closet was larger.
Fire investigators confirmed the blaze was intentionally set.
Nash’s family was devastated not only by his death but by the fact that firefighters initially failed to find his body. Two hours passed before Nash’s son discovered his dad.
“If my family had not entered that building, my brother would probably still be lying dead in that building,” the victim’s sister Debra Nash told local CBS affiliate WDJT the day after the fire.
She couldn’t believe it.
“How did you guys miss my brother?” she said. “How could that happen? That’s, like, awful.”
The post Woman’s boyfriend told her to move out of his apartment so she burned it down, killing a 71-year-old man who lived 2 floors above them first appeared on Law & Crime.
