Arsonist David Blagdon was to learn today if he was to be released from a life sentence for setting fire to a pair of curtains.

Blagdon was due to face a parole board headed by High Court judge Mr Justice Tucker at Lindholme Prison, on the outskirts of Doncaster.

The 48-year-old, of Kingston Lisle, near Wantage, has spent the past 21 years behind bars.

He is a "discretionary lifer'' the term for anyone who has been convicted of serious offences other than murder. It is more usually given to those guilty of manslaughter, attempted murder, rape, armed robbery or arson.

A petition calling for Blagdon's release and signed by 2,000 Oxford Mail readers was handed to Home Secretary Jack Straw at his home in Minster Lovell at the weekend. The three-strong parole board technically has the power to free Blagdon today.

However, his solicitor Kevin O'Gorman said: "We'll be hoping for a release, of course, but it is more likely that the judge will order a plan to be put in place for David to be released.

"The judge may decide it is not fair to David just to open the gates there and then and say 'Go'.

"He may decide that this would not be in David's best interests.

"But we are hopeful of a good result." Blagdon's crime of setting fire to the curtains at St Laurence's Church in South Hinksey, causing 1,000 worth of damage, has long been recognised as a cry for help after his foster parents died within days of each other. He had stolen a bicycle and, after committing the crime, sat and waited for police.