PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A former Montgomery County resident has been charged with starting two fires last month — one at a transmission shop where he used to work, the other at a property where he’d previously been convicted of arson.
Sean Gahagan, 56, of Lebanon, Pennsylvania, is charged with multiple counts of arson and related offenses.
On Dec. 29, Upper Moreland police said Gahagan threw a cinder block through the window of JG Transmissions on Davisville Road in Willow Grove. He tried to rob the business but when he didn’t find any cash, he used brake cleaner to start a fire, which destroyed the building.
That same day, Lower Moreland police said he smashed the window of a shed behind a home on Huntingdon Pike in Huntingdon Valley, then used the brake cleaner to start a fire in the shed.
Gahagan was arrested in Lebanon County on Jan. 1 for trespassing in a church.
Police said he used to work at JG Transmissions and had stopped by earlier that day asking for work, but the owner told him they weren’t that busy.
According to the criminal complaint, Gahagan told police he lit the shed on fire because he was upset about being ordered to pay $80,000 to the property owner after a 2004 arson conviction.