ELLSWORTH, Maine — A Bar Harbor man has pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor and was sentenced Friday to time served for starting a fire in his apartment last spring.
Jimmy R. Deiters, 56, had been charged with two counts of arson and one count of aggravated criminal mischief in connection with the April 15, 2015, blaze at Harbor Hill Estates on Highbrook Road.
Those charges were dismissed after Deiters recently reached an agreement with the Hancock County District Attorney’s Office to plead no contest to a lesser charge of criminal mischief. Had he been convicted of arson, which is a Class A felony, Deiters could have faced up to 30 years in prison and a $50,000 fine on each of the two counts.
On Friday, Deiters was sentenced by Justice Robert Murray to serve 90 days in jail and received credit for time served. Deiters was unable to make his initial $50,000 cash bail after his arrest last year and was held at Hancock County Jail in Ellsworth for four months, until his bail was amended in mid-August.
According to documents on file at Hancock County Unified Criminal Court, other tenants saw Deiters pedaling away from the apartment complex on his bicycle a short time before the fire was discovered. Other tenants called the fire department after hearing smoke alarms and seeing smoke coming from the apartment.
Responding firefighters quickly doused the fire, which had been kept in check by the building’s sprinkler system. The building has 24 other apartments in it, but damage from the blaze was limited to Deiters’ unit.
Court documents indicated that the fire appeared to have started with a rolled-up newspaper that had been placed between two boards leaning against a wall inside the apartment.
