An extradition hearing for the mother of a man suspected of setting dozens of fires over New Year's weekend was postponed for the second time in a week today when she refused the offer of a federal public defender and alleged that she had been beaten by jail staff.

Dorothee Burkhart, 53, is in the initial stages of efforts by federal officials to deport her to her native Germany to face fraud charges. However, extradition proceedings cannot begin until a defense attorney is appointed.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Margaret A. Nagle said a panel attorney -- an experienced private trial attorney -- would be appointed to represent Burkhart in time for her next court date Tuesday.

The mother of serial arson suspect Harry Burkhart began speaking out from the moment she was brought shackled into the downtown courtroom.

"I was beaten and tortured downstairs," the squat, blond woman said loudly, raising her arm to try to reveal some sort of injury. "In this prison, beating of inmates is normal."     

She also insisted that her son, who is facing 37 felony counts of arson, is innocent.

"He didn't do this fire," she said. "One little mentally ill child couldn't do this -- it is technically impossible."

Then, she added, "The Nazis have found us... We are victims of Nazi persecution."

At that point, Nagle broke in, telling the defendant the hearing would be terminated if she did not sit down and stop putting on a "show."

The judge said that once a defense attorney is appointed, the proceedings could move on from the initial stages.

Dorothee Burkhart said she needed to gather evidence from Canada and Germany to fight extradition.

The woman's arrest last week on a fugitive warrant out of Germany apparently prompted her son's suspected arson spree, which caused an estimated $3 million in damage, prosecutors said.

Harry Burkhart, a 24-year-old German national who was living in the same Hollywood apartment house as his mother, was charged in state court with 37 felony counts of arson and is being held in lieu of $2.85 million bail. He is scheduled to be arraigned Jan. 24.

Meanwhile, police in Vancouver are investigating whether the arson suspect was also responsible for a string of about a dozen unsolved fires in British Columbia last year.

Harry Burkhart was arrested early Monday in connection with the four-day fire spree that began a week ago and burned some 53 locations, mostly in Hollywood and West Hollywood, but also in North Hollywood, Studio City, Sherman Oaks and Burbank.

A warrant for Dorothee Burkhart's arrest was issued in Germany in 2007, according to court papers.

She is accused of subletting apartments that she did not own, failing to pay rent and security deposits on other locations, and defrauding a Frankfurt cosmetic surgeon out of the equivalent of about $10,000 for breast augmentation surgery she never paid for, according to court papers.