Firefighters arrived within five minutes of 911 calls about smoke at an apartment building at North 91st Street and West Hampton Avenue last week.

Inside a hallway, they found Robert Feldner, 74, badly burned. He had died before the fire started, investigators later determined, after being beaten, stabbed and cut repeatedly.

His downstairs neighbor, Michael Kalif Harris, 41, was charged Tuesday with first-degree intentional homicide and arson in Feldner's May 8 death.

Harris had been arrested just days earlier after firing a gun at a house on North 37th Street but was released on the misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct with a dangerous weapon.

He failed to appear for his first court date in that case, May 7, and a warrant was issued. The next day, police say, he killed Feldner.

He appeared in court Monday on both cases and was ordered to undergo a forensic mental examination because his lawyer believed Harris is not legally competent to proceed.

According to the criminal complaint:

Harris and his brother lived downstairs from Feldner. On May 8, the brother, who was in Racine for work, got a call from Harris about 8 a.m. "I'm here with Bob Feldner. He wants to talk to you," Harris said.

But the brother said he couldn't really make out anything Feldner might have been saying over a speakerphone. The brother tried to ask Feldner if he was safe or in danger but only heard mumbling.

Then Harris got back on the line and told his brother words to the effect of, "You won," and hung up.

Firefighters found Feldner in the first-floor hallway, where the fire appeared to have started. Inside Harris' apartment, police found a knife and a cigarette lighter.

When police arrived, they found Harris in a state of mental distress and arrested him. Video from a gas station across the street showed him getting some gasoline in a pail and walking back to his building about 10 minutes before the 911 calls about the smoke.

Harris' brother told investigators Harris suffers from mental illness.

Feldner served in the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War era, according to his obituary.

Contact Bruce Vielmetti at (414) 224-2187 or bvielmetti@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @ProofHearsay.