OLD ORCHARD BEACH — When Old Orchard Beach Fire Chief Ricky Plummer was arrested and charged with arson last weekend, it got other fire departments in which Plummer once worked to thinking: Is it possible he started fires in their communities?

Before becoming Old Orchard Beach’s fire chief in September 2014, Plummer worked for more than 25 years in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, retiring as fire chief there in 2001. After that, he held a succession of jobs in North Yarmouth, Gray, Standish, Biddeford and Cumberland in Maine as well as in Cocoa, Florida, and Marlborough, Massachusetts.

Now officials associated with those communities are investigating cold-case fires to see if there’s a possibility Plummer may have been involved in more than simply fighting them.

Plummer, 59, of Biddeford, was arrested on May 7 and charged with arson in connection with a seven-alarm brush and woods fire on April 15 that spanned about 40 acres near Jones Creek in Old Orchard Beach and took about 100 firefighters from several communities two hours to extinguish. Residents from nearby apartments and condominiums had to be evacuated for a short period.

According to an affidavit prepared by Maine Forest Ranger Matthew Bennett, Plummer told authorities he was responsible for the fire, but it was not intentional. He claimed he smoked a cigarette in the woods, and that the blaze started after he discarded the cigarette and matches.

Plummer has been put on administrative leave from his job, and was released from jail on $10,000 bail on Monday.

Maine State Fire Marshal Joseph Thomas said Friday his office was following “standard protocol” and conducting a case review of unsolved suspicious fire cases in Maine municipalities where Plummer worked.

Kathleen Levesque, executive assistant for Portsmouth Police Chief David Mara, said the police chief will talk with the city’s fire chief to determine if there are any cases of suspicious fires in Plummer’s tenure that are worth revisiting.

And Samantha Senger, spokeswoman for the city of Cocoa, Florida, said in an email that the Florida state fire marshal’s office would be responsible for any investigation, and that the city will monitor the case as it progresses and work with the state fire marshal as necessary.

The Main Street Journal, a newspaper in Marlborough, Massachusetts, reported in August 2011 that Plummer resigned as chief from that city’s fire department after less than a year and a half.

The newspaper reported that some members of the city’s personnel committee had expressed concern with Plummer’s frequent change of employment, and were told by Plummer that after retiring from the Portsmouth Fire Department in 2001, he had taken on the role as a “fix-it” chief – solving a problem in a department and then moving on.

According to an affidavit on the OOB case, Plummer can be seen on surveillance cameras at a motel located near the April 15 blaze shortly before and after the time the fire is believed to have started.

No cigarette butts or matches were found in an examination of the area where Plummer claimed to have been smoking, the affidavit states.

— Staff Writer Liz Gotthelf can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 325 or egotthelf@journaltribune.com.