2 plead guilty to fatal arson at dormitory

Nearly seven years after a dormitory fire killed three students at Seton Hall University, two former roommates pleaded guilty in Newark to arson, admitting for the first time that they set a banner ablaze in a prank that got tragically out of hand.

Joseph T. LePore and Sean Ryan, both 26, struck a deal with prosecutors as they were about to go on trial on murder charges. They will get no more than five years in prison, compared with 30 years or more if they had been convicted of murder.

Prosecutors said LePore and Ryan, up late after celebrating a victory by the basketball team, set the banner on fire in a third-floor lounge around 4:30 a.m. on Jan. 19, 2000, and the flames spread to a couch. The fire was largely confined to the lounge, but choking smoke spread throughout the six-story dorm.