A 49-year-old Buxton man was arrested late Friday night after he tried to set fire to his house with his wife and children inside, according to police.
When officers arrived at his Burnham Drive home after 11 p.m., Danny Bridges was backing into his house as he poured out the contents of a gas can, the Buxton Police Department said in a news release Saturday.
Bridges ignored officers’ orders to drop the can, and kept pouring gas on the stairs and floor inside the house, police said. He lit a fire, but officers extinguished it and arrested him.
Bridges’ wife, 14-year-old daughter and two adult stepchildren were home at the time.
Dispatchers said they received a tip late Friday night that a man at that residence was threatening to do harm to his family. Bridges also called police dispatch himself – it’s unclear whether this was the same call as the tip – to say that he would be waiting for police in his driveway with a firearm because he was “tired of being arrested.”
The police news release did not say that Bridges ultimately followed through with the threat of bringing a gun.
He was charged with arson, a felony, and faces charges of domestic violence as well, police said.
After his arrest, Bridges was taken to Southern Maine Health Care and then to the York County Jail.
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