James Street fire victims identified, investigation continues
By
By GARY LIBERATORE
Story Created:
Sep 21, 2009 at 7:06 PM EST
Story Updated:
Sep 21, 2009 at 7:10 PM EST
UTICA, N.Y. (WKTV) - The Utica Police Department has released the names of the four victims who died in Sunday's apartment fire on James Street. They are three males: 24-year-old Douglas Crane, 28-year-old Glenard Drake, 41-year-old Bruce Bush and one female: 28-year-old Terry Singh.
Singh could be heard on a 911 call released by the fire department. Singh talks with a 911 operator and he tried to direct her on how to get out, but she says the only way out is through a window, and the window is too small for her to fit through. Utica Fire Chief Russell Brooks calls the audio haunting.
As far as the investigation into the cause, no information came out from the authorities on Monday. They did say it started in the kitchen of one of the first floor rear apartments, where one of the victims was recovered.
Utica Fire Marshal Raymond Beck said the fire traveled up the plumbing system, "We refer to that as balloon construction, you have cavities in the walls that run from the basement up to the attic area, make a perfect chase for fire to follow without any resistance."
The owner of the building, Timothy Klotz, was issued an appearance ticket in April of 2008 for failing to register the structure with the fire department rental dwelling inspection program. Klotz pleaded guilty in June of 2008 for failing to register the building and was fined one hundred dollars. The plea also involved a conditional discharge that he register the property within 10 days.
According to the Beck, fire department records indicate that the building was never registered, "What I can say is if he was registered, we would have inspected and brought the building up to code."
When asked why Klotz was never brought back into court, Beck said "Again the fact that we are in a manual system, where everything was done with paper documents, again it's a tracking system and now its computerated, before it wasn't. What I can say is as far as whether someone followed up it, How i am going to respond to that is, if i was given a directive from a court, from a judge I would have complied with it."
Utica City Court Judge John Balzano said Monday that once the sentencing took place, it was out of the court's hands. The Judge says if the court received a subsequent notice from the City that Klotz had not registered, they could issue a bench warrant for his arrest, but the Court never received that follow-up from the city.
We tried to contact the City Codes attorney, Joan Harris to get clarification as to what legally is supposed to happen when following up on a non compliance to register, but so far, have not yet received a call back.
Stay with WKTV.com for all of the latest information released on the case.
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