A Carroll County man pleaded guilty Thursday to at least 10 counts of arson and was sentenced to 78 years with 18 to serve in prison.

Stephen Howard Acree Jr., 29, will also have to pay $180,000 in restitution to the victims for property damages.

“Mr. Acree had first come to my attention when he was arrested for stalking in 2001 and was on probation for peeping Tom from 2004,” Senior Assistant District Attorney Anne Allen said. “He was a serial arsonist and a dangerous person. Carroll County is safer with him in prison.”

During the first two years of Acree’s 60-year probation he will be under intensive probation which includes an ankle monitor for the first year and an order that he must maintain gainful employment.

To ensure that the victims receive the full amount of restitution, Acree will also have to take out a life insurance policy in the full $180,000 amount that will list the victims as the beneficiaries of the policy. Therefore, if Acree fails to pay the entire amount before his death, the life insurance policy will cover the remaining dollar amount.

After Acree serves his 18-year prison sentence, he will undergo a psycho-sexual evaluation and abide by whatever recommendations that are made. He will also be banished from the Coweta Judicial Court System, which includes Carroll, Coweta, Heard, Meriwether and Troup counties.

Police arrested Acree on June 10 after two abandoned houses were set on fire earlier that day, one on Highway 100 in Bowdon and another at 436 Dixie St. in Carrollton. After his arrest, investigators linked Acree to at least five arson cases involving vacant residences.

“I think it was a good resolution to the case,” Carrollton police Lt. James Perry said.

There was no apparent pattern to Acree’s arson spree other than the fact that the majority of the counts involved either vacant houses or grass fires, Perry said.

“When I interviewed him after he was arrested, he never gave a solid reason as to why he set the fires,” Perry said. “Some of the houses were somewhat run down and others were in good condition.”

Acree also did not use any type of accelerator such as gasoline to start the fires.

“He used available materials at each location,” Perry said. “He would use whatever he could find there.”

During the investigation, police identified a number of witnesses who either saw Acree personally leaving one of the fires or identified a vehicle that Acree allegedly used to flee the scene.

All of the combined witness reports gave the investigator in charge of the case, Sgt. Shannon Cantrell, a description of Acree’s person and his car. He was described as a white man, approximately 30 years old, around 6 feet tall with a medium build, a bald or shaved head, wearing a white “wife beater” tank top.

Acree was seen driving a green Toyota Tercel registered to a woman with whom Acree was living at 105 W. White St. in Carrollton.

During the preliminary hearing, Cantrell produced substantial evidence against Acree, including photos stored in his cell phone of two house fires and a receipt for a drink purchase in Bowdon around the time the Bowdon fire may have started, though Acree told authorities he had never been to Bowdon.

Acree will now have to answer to two additional counts of arson in Douglas County, Allen said.