A Bowling Green man who admitted guilt in a fire that caused major damage to the Wendy’s on the U.S. 31-W By-Pass will be sentenced this spring.

A plea agreement filed Monday was signed Feb. 11 by Michael Sheehan in which he agreed to plead guilty in Warren Circuit Court to charges of second-degree arson, third-degree burglary, first-degree criminal mischief, tampering with physical evidence and intimidating a participant in the legal process.

Sheehan worked as a shift manager at the Wendy’s location when it was damaged Feb. 21, 2024, by a fire.

According to court records and prior testimony, police investigating the fire learned that money was missing from the safe in the business and a DVR box containing the store’s surveillance footage had been cut and removed.

A district manager for the business informed the Bowling Green Police Department that the store on the by-pass had been burglarized eight months before the fire, so she had the safe in the store re-keyed and issued new keys to four people, including Sheehan.

BGPD’s investigation of the fire involved reviewing surveillance footage from numerous surrounding businesses, which enabled detectives to see a person burglarizing the Wendy’s on video in the early morning hours of Feb. 21.

“The suspect appeared to be a white male, with a normal to skinny build, wearing all black clothing and what appeared to be black anti-slip shoes, like those worn by restaurant employees,” BGPD Detective Jordan Tyree said in an affidavit on March 26 to obtain a search warrant for two phones and an iPad seized from Sheehan’s residence.

Footage shows the burglar running across the street from Wendy’s and dropping a dark sweatshirt on the side of the Bypass that police later recovered.

“Shortly after (the suspect) flees the scene, the business was observed going up in smoke and the suspect continued fleeing,” Tyree testified last year during a preliminary hearing in Warren District Court.

The Bowling Green Fire Department found some accelerant at the scene of the fire, Tyree testified last year.

Along with the district manager, city police also interviewed Sheehan’s girlfriend, who told detectives that Sheehan had acknowledged setting the fire in the back storage room of the business, court records show.

“(Sheehan’s girlfriend) advised that Sheehan was ‘freaking out’ because the district manager … was about to review camera footage to see who had been stealing money from the store,” Tyree said in the affidavit for the search warrant. “(Sheehan’s girlfriend) advised that Sheehan had told her that he had to go get ‘the box’ and destroy any video evidence that may exist.”

BGPD arrested Sheehan on March 13.

The Wendy’s was reopened in November.

A grand jury meeting in January returned additional charges against Sheehan, indicting him for tampering with a witness, unlawful use of a tracking device and violation of a Kentucky emergency protective order/domestic violence order, although those charges were dismissed as part of his plea agreement.

The agreement recommends a 20-year prison sentence on the arson charge, the maximum allowed under the law for second-degree arson, along with concurrent five-year sentences on the remaining criminal counts.

Sheehan would also be required under the plea agreement to pay an undetermined amount of restitution.

Sheehan is set to return to court on April 29 to be sentenced by Warren Circuit Judge John Grise.