A security fence has sparked dueling lawsuits between Pa. Gov. Josh Shapiro and his Abington neighbors

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro’s Abington Township neighbors filed a federal lawsuit Monday against Pennsylvania’s first couple, in what is the latest clash over security upgrades to his personal home following an arson attack on the governor’s Harrisburg residence while Shapiro and his family slept inside.

In the suit, filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, the Shapiros’ neighbors in Abington Township, Jeremy and Simone Mock, accuse the governor and his wife, Lori Shapiro, of illegally occupying part of the Mocks’ yard to build an eight-foot security fence last summer in what they claim in the lawsuit is an “outrageous abuse of power.”

In short, they asked a federal judge to order the Shapiros off their property.

The Shapiros quickly filed a counter-suit in Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas on Monday against the Mocks, asking a judge to declare that the disputed chunk of the property has been theirs for years.

The attempt to build the new fence is part of a larger security upgrade for Shapiro and his family, following the April firebombing of the state-owned governor’s residence in Harrisburg, when a man broke in to the mansion and set off Molotov cocktails that quickly engulfed part of the home. Cody Balmer, 38, pleaded guilty in October to attempted murder and was sentenced to 25 to 50 years in prison.

The Mocks, whose property is adjacent to the Shapiros’ Montgomery County property, say the planned location of the fence is on their property unlawfully and violates their rights, according to the lawsuit.

The couple is represented by Wally Zimolong, a Delaware County attorney who is described as “the ‘go-to’ lawyer in Pennsylvania for conservative causes and candidates” on his firm’s website. He previously represented the political campaigns of President Donald Trump and U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick, R.-Pa., according to his website.

“The Governor looks forward to a swift resolution and will not be bullied by anyone trying to score cheap political points, especially at the expense of his family’s safety and wellbeing,” Will Simons, a spokesperson for Shapiro, a Democrat running for reelection, said in a statement.

According to the Mocks’ lawsuit, the Shapiros approached their neighbors in July to discuss the construction of a security fence near where their yards meet. The Shapiros were interested in purchasing a portion of the Mock’s property for the fence, and also discussed a lease option. But the couples couldn’t agree on the price, according to the suit.

Things took a turn in late August, when, according to the lawsuit, the Shapiros’ attorney told the Mocks they would obtain the chunk of land through “alternative actions.”

“What followed was an outrageous abuse of power by the sitting Governor of Pennsylvania and its former Attorney General,” the complaint says. (Shapiro served as Pennsylvania’s attorney general before he was elected governor in 2022.)

The Shapiros told the Mock family, according to the neighbors’ lawsuit, that they owned the land through adverse possession, a legal mechanism through which a person can gain ownership of a property they’ve actively used for at least 21 years. The Shapiros have lived in their Montgomery County home for 23 years.

The governor and first lady then began planting arborvitae-type trees and other plants on the Mocks’ property, flying drones over it, threatening to remove healthy trees, and “chasing away” contractors who came to work in the Mocks’ yard, the lawsuit claims.

The complaint also accuses Shapiro of directing state police to patrol the property. Troopers instructed the Mocks to leave the area of the yard multiple times, calling it a “disputed” area or “security zone,” the suit says.

The Mocks purchased the house in 2017, according to property records, and their lawsuit says they have paid taxes on the over the time period. The offer to purchase the land shows the Shapiros knew it wasn’t theirs, according to the complaint.

“The Shapiros continue to occupy the Mock Property without permission or any legal justification whatsoever,” the lawsuit says.

The security fencing was for the Shapiros’ home was purchased but ultimately never installed, and is being repurposed at the Pennsylvania State Police training academy, Spotlight PA previously reported.

Zimolong declined to comment on the lawsuit Monday.

The Shapiros' countersuit

The Shapiros’ lawsuit doesn’t dispute many elements of the Mocks’ suit, but casts them in a different light.

As the Shapiros tell it, a land surveyor discovered in summer 2025 that the Mocks actually owned about 2,900 square feet of land that the Shapiros had believed was a part of their property since they bought the home in 2003. That time period, 22 years, satisfies Pennsylvania’s adverse possession law.

The Mocks didn’t consider that part of the property to be theirs, according to the complaint, until the Shapiros told them.

But after negotiations fell apart when the Shapiros attempted to purchase the land, the Mocks sought a permit to erect their own fence and include the disputed area on their property, the suit says.

Shapiro’s security detail denied a tree-removal contractor access to the area, according to the complaint, because the first couple believe they possessed the land.

And the state police troopers the Mocks saw were part of Shapiro’s security detail, which after the April attack have conducted review of his Abington home.

The governor and his wife are asking a judge to find that they are the “legal and equitable owners” of the area in dispute.

Scrutiny over security

Shapiro has faced scrutiny for using taxpayer dollars with little transparency to upgrade the security of his personal home, which is the primary residence for two of his four children, who are school-aged. State Police spent at least $1 million to upgrade security on his Abington Township property, in addition to more than $32 million in upgrades and repairs to the Harrisburg governor’s mansion.

The GOP-controlled Senate Intergovernmental Operations Committee in December took the rare step of subpoenaing Shapiro for access to records about how taxpayer dollars were spent to upgrade the Shapiro property and home, including a new security system and landscaping work previously reported by Spotlight PA. Sen. Jarrett Coleman, R.-Lehigh, who chairs the committee, argued the subpoenas were necessary because the Shapiro administration did not turn over the requested documents, or turned over incomplete records.

As the Democratic governor of the nation’s fifth most-populous state, Shapiro continues to face threats to his safety. Police arrested a Carlisle man last week for allegedly sending messages to the governor’s office, that said “I do plan on stalking and hurting your family, before adding “metaphorically speaking of course.” The man, George R. Brown Jr., later told police they were “fake threats” and he was trying to get help with an eye injury he suffered while at Cumberland County Prison, PennLive reported.

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