‘He’s just been a wrecking ball’: Accused arsonist in SW Portland apartment fire hit with stalking order day before blaze

The man accused of setting the fire that destroyed a 113-year-old apartment building near downtown Portland on May 16 has been arrested four other times and was slapped with a restraining order the day before the blaze broke out, court records show.

Garrett A. Repp was arrested Thursday evening on 31 charges, including multiple counts of first-degree arson, reckless endangerment and first-degree criminal mischief in the fire at the May apartments in the city’s Goose Hollow neighborhood.

No one was seriously injured during the inferno, but the flames displaced the residents of all 42 units and killed an unknown number of pets. The building likely will be torn down.

Portland Police spokesperson Sgt. Kevin Allen said Repp, 30, was arrested the day of the blaze because building management had reported him on May 9 for “breaking through the wall of his apartment” and tunneling into the vacant unit next door. Repp was charged with one count of first-degree criminal mischief and released later on May 16. The case has since been closed.

Repp was previously arrested on charges of second-degree disorderly conduct in December and twice in April for trespassing, court records show. Only one of those cases remains open, which alleges Repp was trespassing inside his ex-girlfriend’s apartment building, located some six blocks from the May.

A probable cause affidavit in the trespassing case says officers were forced to break down his ex-girlfriend’s door with a fireman’s ax on April 21 after Repp, inside, refused to open it. Repp was released the next day but rearrested minutes later after he began kicking the glass doors inside the Police Bureau’s lobby and then ran down a ramp outside leading to the jail’s secure underground entrance, according to the affidavit.

Izzy Blankenship, who is named in the affidavit as the unit’s owner, said in an interview with the Oregonian/OregonLive that she returned to her building on Northwest 16th Avenue and found that Repp had used her bed and furniture as a makeshift barricade and ripped a security alarm out of the wall.

“He’s just been a wrecking ball for my life,” she said.

Blankenship, 26, said she met Repp in 2021 at the Southpark Seafood restaurant, where she worked as a cook and he served as a dishwasher.

The two hit it off at first, but Blankenship said she ended the relationship last August after Repp began using methamphetamine and acting increasingly paranoid.

Repp would talk to imaginary figures in Blankenship’s presence, she said, and he would frequently throw away his cellphone because he believed someone was listening. Repp also kept a “doomsday package” of survival gear packed in his car, Blankenship said.

She said she tried to maintain a level of contact with Repp, but the situation became untenable after Repp began trespassing at her building when she wasn’t home, culminating in the April 21 incident.

Blankenship described what happened that day in a restraining order that was granted by a judge May 15, according to records reviewed by the Oregonian/OregonLive.

“His behavior became so erratic that I was starting to worry that he could do anything,” she said. “I really want him to get the help that he so desperately needs.”

Blankenship said she is fighting her own eviction case due to the damage at her unit.

Repp was well-known to residents at the May apartments, according to interviews with three tenants, who said he had pulled the fire alarm for no reason more than a dozen times since he moved in last November and had chased female tenants with a sword or banged on their doors.

Blankenship said she was unaware that Repp was activating the alarm at the May until she read news stories about the fire, but she confirmed that he owned several medieval-style swords.

John Judge, a resident at the May, said he frequently saw Repp sitting on the front stoop smoking, with a “crazy look in his eye.”

When he would set off the fire alarm for no apparent reason, it often took firefighters half an hour or so to respond and turn it off, Judge said.

“After a while it had gotten to be monotonous,” Judge said of the frequency of the alarms being activated. “It was just like, ‘OK, it’s him again.’ ”

Judge said it was unclear why Repp was never arrested for allegedly pulling the alarm or harassing other tenants.

Rachel Elkins, a spokesperson for the building’s owner, SkyNat Property Management, said the company was not commenting on the matter at the direction of their attorney.

SkyNat filed an eviction order against Repp on Feb. 14, alleging he owed $3,400 in back rent and fees. Repp failed to appear in court to challenge the allegation, records show, and on May 10 a judge ordered sheriff’s deputies to remove him from his third-floor apartment.

The brick building at 1410 S.W. Taylor was consumed by flames five days later. Repp is lodged without bail at the county’s downtown jail.

Zane Sparling; zsparling@oregonian.com; 503-319-7083; @pdxzane