STATE FIRE MARSHAL
CONFIRMS VASSALBORO, MAINE HOUSE BLAZE DELIBERATELY SET BY MENTALLY ILL OWNER
Home owner Scott John Audet was previously charged with
burning his house in Oakland in 2003 but found not criminally responsible.
January 28, 2015
VASSALBORO, MAINE — A man found not responsible for setting his
house on fire nearly 12 years ago because he was mentally ill was evaluated by
medical personnel Wednesday morning after authorities responded to an
intentionally set fire at a house he owns on Mudget Hill Road.
The fire damaged part of the house late Wednesday morning,
and the Office of the State Fire Marshal confirmed it was arson.
State troopers escort Scott Audet, the owner of a residence
on the Mudget Hill Road in Vassalboro, to be checked by ambulance personnel
after firefighters put out fire that did serious damage to his home on
Wednesday.
Firefighters from several departments extinguished a fire at
a home on Mudget Hill Road in Vassalboro on Wednesday morning. Staff photo by
David Leaming
The Vassalboro property is owned by Scott John Audet, 42,
who was charged in 2003 with arson in connection with a home he owned at the
time in Oakland. In 2004, Audet was found criminally not responsible for the
March 2003 arson blaze.
Audet, who had closed on the purchase of the Vassalboro
house five weeks ago, was the only person at the home at the time the fire
broke out Wednesday morning. No charges have been filed in connection with the
fire. Sgt. Ken Grimes of the fire marshal’s office would not say whether Audet
is considered a suspect in the case, citing an ongoing investigation.
At the scene, Vassalboro Fire Chief Eric Rowe would only say
the fire had been set by someone inside the house.
Sgt. Blaine Bronson of the Maine State Police said state
troopers were sent to the house after receiving a report from an employee at
Riverview Psychiatric Center, the state-run psychiatric hospital for the
mentally ill in Augusta. A resident of the house had called the hospital and
said he had set his bed on fire, Bronson said.
Grimes said the fire originated in the kitchen and an
upstairs bedroom. He would not comment on the cause of the fire or how it was
started, but confirmed it had been set.
Audet has a history of treatment at the psychiatric center.
After being found criminally not responsible in March 2004 on charges that he
set fire to a home he owned at 146 Oak St. in Oakland, he was committed to the
custody of the Department of Health and Human Services, according to court
records.
The court retained jurisdiction of the case, which was last
heard in 2011, when a judge ruled that he could be allowed to self-administer
medication and could drive anywhere in Maine, but was prohibited from having
drugs, alcohol, firearms or weapons.
The court also required that an outpatient treatment team
from Riverview visit Audet two times a week for at least six months after he moved
to his own apartment.
Audet sold the Oakland property in April 2004, registry
records show, a month after the finding that he was not criminally responsible
for that fire. He returned to Riverview for a series of brief hospitalizations
in the summer of 2013 and moved back into the community each time. There was no
indication in the court’s file that he had been hospitalized at Riverview
during 2014.
Wednesday’s fire was reported to the Vassalboro Fire
Department at around 11:30 a.m. Audet bought and moved into the house at 250
Mudget Hill Road last month, according to records at the Kennebec Registry of
Deeds. Registry filings indicate that the sale closed on Dec. 19 and that the
home was bought with a $228,000 mortgage guaranteed by the Department of Veterans
Affairs.
A week after the closing on the sale of the Vassalboro
property, Susan Fasulo, a mental health caseworker for the Riverview
Psychiatric Center Outpatient Services team in Augusta, filed a letter with
Kennebec County Court stating that Audet “bought and moved into his own home.”
Derrick Dyer, a neighbor who was snowblowing his
grandmother’s driveway across the street at the time of the fire Wednesday,
said he heard screaming and saw black smoke coming from the house. He said he
didn’t know who lived there, but said the house was recently built.
The house was badly damaged and will not be livable, Grimes
said. Firefighters from China and Winslow also responded to the fire. There
were no injuries reported.
Staff writers Michael Shepherd and Betty Adams contributed to this story