Jim Kerrigan thinks a "firebug" might be loose in the Holme Circle area.

It is the only rational explanation he can think of for the criminally mischievous, and sometimes downright frightening, incidents that have occurred at and around his neighborhood Sunoco service station during the last nine months -- culminating on the early morning of Sept. 8, when someone rigged a stolen moving truck to barrel into his business.

The crash caused a gasoline leak from the still-running truck. The fuel combined with flammable material typically found at auto-repair outlets and ignited a fire that caused significant structural damage to the service station.

The building has since been condemned by the city Department of Licenses and Inspections. The fire marshal's office is investigating the incident as a case of arson.

Kerrigan says he plans to rebuild the gas station. But he also fears that if the culprit isn't identified in the multiple attacks that have occurred at his and other area businesses, the reconstruction could be for naught.

"We have to do something to stop these people. We're willing the Kerrigan family to put up a five-thousand-dollar reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of whoever is responsible for this," said the businessman, who operates two other service stations outside of the city.

"My biggest concern is, how are we going to prevent this from happening again? What kind of protection are the businessmen of this area going to get from the authorities?" he said.

The truck that smashed into his shop is the latest in a pattern of scares, or possibly veiled threats, speculates Kerrigan, that he has received. Most have involved arson.

It all began last Dec. 31.

LEFT DRY AT THE PUMP

Sometime during the early-morning hours of New Year's Eve, hoses and nozzles from the six fuel pumps at Kerrigan's Sunoco station, at 2899 Welsh Road, at its intersection with Holme Avenue, were detached and stolen, leaving his business ill-equipped to handle customers' gasoline needs when it opened later that day.

"That put us out of business for quite a bit that day, and that's probably one of the busiest gas days of the year," said Kerrigan, noting that it cost about $3,500 to replace the equipment. "So actually that was the first problem that we had."

About a month later, vandals struck again.

Someone smashed the windows of a customer's car, which had been serviced at the station, and set fire to the interior during the wee hours of Feb. 3.

Two months later, again in the early morning when the station was closed, someone poured flammable liquid around the bay window and front door of the Sunoco station office and ignited it.

Firefighters responded in time to prevent serious damage to his business, Kerrigan said.

But he remains concerned about the prospects of a catastrophe.

"At any given time, we could have thirty-thousand gallons of gasoline on hand here at this location," he said. "And, God forbid, something like that happened where that gasoline (exploded). I mean, there's lives at stake here."

After that April incident, the fires ceased. In fact, four months of relative tranquility went by.

Then, unexpectedly, fire returned to Holme Circle.

PATTERN OF VEHICLE FIRES

A series of five car fires, including four in a shopping-strip parking lot adjacent to the Kerrigan Sunoco property, sparked more concern, confusion and an investigation.

Starting with an Aug. 10 fire that engulfed a 1983 Pontiac, cases of vehicular arson occurred on Aug. 18, 29 and Sept. 6 at the Holme Circle Shopping Center lot, according to the fire marshal's office.

Within that period, there also were two other cases of vehicular arson on nearby stretches of Holme Avenue.

A spokesman for the fire marshal's office told the Times that a car belonging to a delivery person for Holme Style Pizza, on the 2900 block of Holme Ave., was torched at about 3 a.m. on Aug. 18. Two days later, the spokesman confirmed, a storage truck leased by a construction firm building a Beneficial Bank branch at 2845 Holme Ave. also was damaged in a case of arson.

Then, on the first day of September -- seven days before the stolen moving truck crashed into Kerrigan's service station -- fire department personnel responded to a call just before midnight at a former medical office building at 16 Old Ashton Road, owned by AFL-CIO Hospital, that was set ablaze.

Union officials contacted by the Times declined to comment on the matter.

Aside from that fire and the Aug. 10 car fire at the plaza parking lot, all of the arsons occurred after midnight.

The Sunoco station property and the Holme Circle Shopping Center are holdings of Seravalli Real Estate Associates, a firm owned by Northeast contractor Charles Seravalli. Through a representative, Seravalli declined comment on the incidents.

FEELING ON EDGE

The spokesman for the fire marshal's office said the thefts of the hoses from pumps at Kerrigan's station may not be related to the cases of arson, though all of the crimes are being actively investigated.

Kerrigan says he is baffled by the incidents at his station, noting that he even wondered at one point if the attacks were being committed by a dissatisfied customer.

He quickly dismissed such thoughts.

"People say, 'Boy, who did you make angry? One of your customers?'" Kerrigan said. "Believe me, we have a great reputation as far as the auto-repair industry goes. We don't have problems like that. You always handle your problems immediately and satisfy your customers. . . . We have no ongoing or past issues that I can recollect that would cause things like this to be happening."

Beyond their emotional toll, the recent crimes have had a financial impact on Kerrigan's operations and his employees. Insurance should cover the cost of restoring his gas station, but Kerrigan will lose several months of revenue during the construction.

"I have a ton of lost revenue. I have ten employees who depend on me to make a living for their families that are now out of work," he said. "Who cares about that?

"Those people pull a paycheck out of here, and for the next one-hundred-twenty days, they aren't going to."

Kerrigan hopes that a $5,000 reward will entice someone to provide information that will bring the suspect -- or suspects -- to justice.

"This is getting scary," said Kerrigan. "I don't know where to go from here. It's going to take us three to four months to rebuild our business and get this building back to where it was. And what's going to stop this from happening again?"