Who or what caused the "phantom fires" of Canneto di Caronia

In 2004 (and 2014, but more about that later) a series of strange fires started in a small rural community on Sicily. The fires seemingly broke out at random. Pieces of furniture, power sockets, piles of freshly washed clothes, even water pipes caught fire. When the situation started to overwhelm the local fire department, the energy provider sent technicians to the town to check if some fault in the power grid was to blame for the phenomenon. According to newspapers they conducted a thorough evaluation of the infrastructure but found nothing out of the ordinary. The "phantom fires" however kept happening. So they decided to take the whole village of the power grid. The fires didn't stop. Local police even reported observing how things, everyday objects really, started burning out of thin air. The situation was seemingly out of control and, obviously, scared the hell out of the Italian villagers. As a last resort measure, the district government ordered an evacuation of Canneto di Caronia, and inhabitants were moved to surrounding towns. Meanwhile scientists from all over Italy (and Europe) travelled to Canneto to investigate the fires. Reportedly they even had NASA-scientists and the Italian army researching the cause of the phenomenon. They didn't find anything out of the ordinary, except for some above-average electromagnetic readings. Then, suddenly, the fires stopped.



The "phantom fires" seemed to vanish roughly 8 months after they were first reported, and the story of Canneto di Caronia faded from the public view. But the lack of explanation for the fires naturally opened the door for all sorts of paranormal speculation (the video goes into a bit more detail here, but I won't for the sake of the subreddit). In 2008 a court ruled that the fires were caused by arson, though officials working in the area strongly disagreed with this conclusion.



Then, exactly 10 years after the first "wave" of fires, the mystery was back as if it had never gone away. Random things started burning out of the blue. Unplugged electrical devices, couches, chairs, turned off smartphones, bathroom applicances, ... you get the idea. Then, once again months later, the "phantom fires" vanished once more. But in 2015 the police made an arrest, namely Antonino and Giuseppe Pezzino (father and son). According to investigators they were often seen near fire outbreaks and also talked about arson on wiretapped phone calls. However, a large number of people remain unconvinced by this explanation, including high ranking officials in the police force and fire department. The major also expressed his discontent with how the strange case was shut close. I couldn't find any reporting about a conviction of the two Pezzinos, so I think that at this point the case is still not resolved in court.



That's as much as I could find online. It really is an interesting rabbit hole to go down in my opinion. Feel free to add anything I may have missed!



Here's the video in question (German voiceover but there are English captions available)



And further sources of my little "investigation":



www.nytimes.com/2004/06/24/world/canneto-di-caronia-journal-electricity-goes-wild-did-the-devil-make-it-do-it.html



www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/1567428/Aliens-caused-Sicily-fires-say-officials.html



en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canneto_(Caronia)



news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3479203.stm