A competency hearing has been continued to June 12 for a Delavan man charged with setting fires in three houses and setting a lawnmower and a jet ski on fire in the Town of Delavan.
Daniel J. Zitella, 29, was charged Dec. 18 in Walworth County Circuit Court with three counts of arson of a building and two counts of arson of property other than a building. The competency hearing is to determine whether a plea of not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect is appropriate.
The continuance was granted during a hearing on April 26, according to court records, to allow Zitella’s attorney to have his own doctor perform an evaluation of the defendant.
According to the criminal complaint, Zitella is suspected of setting fires in three homes in his neighborhood and of setting a lawnmower and a jet ski in the same neighborhood on fire.
An Aug. 3, a push mower at a home on Mabie Street that Zitella had borrowed from a neighbor and last used was set on fire outside the home, causing some of the siding on the home to melt, according to the complaint.
The next day, a personal watercraft at the same home that had not been burned when firefighters investigated the lawnmower fire the previous day was set on fire, according to the complaint.
On Dec. 9, 2016, a fire started in the bedroom of a home on Wallis Avenue in the Town of Delavan that Zitella had been asked to check on while the owner was away, the complaint states.
On Dec. 10, 2018, a fire burned the kitchen a Sutter Avenue home to the studs and destroyed part of the ceiling, according to the complaint. A neighbor to the home said Zitella had stopped by his house that morning to borrow money and casually said, “Hey, did you know your neighbor’s house is on fire?” according to the complaint.
Two days later, a fire broke out in that neighbor’s home, the complaint contends. The home showed evidence of forced entry, and three witnesses said they saw Zitella at the home moments before the fire.
Zitella admitted setting the fire at the Wallis Avenue home in 2016 and the fires on Sutter Avenue last December, according to the complaint. He also admitted setting the lawnmower on fire because he was mad at the owner who owed him money but denied setting the Jet Ski on fire, the complaint states.
