Police arrested a 45-year-old Stamford man by warrant on Saturday after DNA evidence connected him to the theft of copper piping from a residential building site on Summer Street.
Sebastiano Sciaretta. Photo courtesy of the New Canaan Police Department
Sebastiano Sciaretta of Newfield Avenue is accused of breaking into a rear window of the home and stealing copper piping overnight on Aug. 26, according to Sgt. Carol Ogrinc, public information officer of the New Canaan Police Department.
An owner of the home—which was not occupied during an extensive renovation—had noticed blood on first-floor piping and investigators took samples and sent them to a state lab, Ogrinc said. That lab came back with a hit on the Sciaretta, who was already in the database following a conviction in 2006 on a felony possession of narcotics charge, according to court records.
Police learned that copper piping also had been stolen from the site some time between Aug. 21 to 23, Ogrinc said, though it had not been reported straightaway.
Sciaretta, who had been working in a contractor capacity as part of a demolition crew on the house, cooperated with police when they presented him with a signed warrant on Dec. 20, Ogrinc said. He had an injury to his hand consistent with someone who had been sawing through copper piping, officials said.
The total value of the copper is about $1,000, Ogrinc said—$500 from each instance of theft.