A missing smoke detector
PHILADELPHIA – The City of Philadelphia faces a lawsuit over a fire in a Griscom Street property that did not have working smoke detectors.
The City failed to require the company that owned the building to supply it with working smoke alarms, a lawsuit filed this month in federal court says, leading to an April 2024 fire that caused “catastrophic burns” to a 9-year-old known as A.N.K.
Donald Hankerson also suffered “serious” burns in the fire, the suit says.
“No Philadelphia ordinance requires one- and two-family dwellings to be inspected for compliance with fire safety regulations,” the suit says.
“The City does not… require one- and two-family rental structures to be inspected for compliance with fire safety regulations and laws.”
This is in contrast to the standards for high-rise properties, which must be inspected for fire code violations, the suit says.
The fire started at around 1:40 am. on April 2, 2024. One of the residents woke to flames between a portable heater and an electrical outlet. Donald Hankerson tried to lead A.N.K. down the stairs to the front door through the smoke but realized A.N.K. was not with him.
A.N.K. had gotten lost and fallen. Donald went back into the building to save him, but not before more than 70% of his body was burned, the suit says. It adds that in addition to the burns and respiratory damage, A.N.K. has suffered the amputation of some of his fingers.
JR 888 LLC owned the property and annually renewed its rental license every year since 2018. Philadelphia, however, did not require working smoke alarms for the single-family home, the suit claims.
“The City was deliberately indifferent to the risk of its policy of tolerating fire safety code violations, and not issuing code violations notices to landlords of one- and two-family dwellings who violated fire safety regulations, which put Plaintiffs and other occupants of one- and two-family dwellings at risk,” wrote attorney Anthony Cianfrani of Cianfrani Law.
Earlier this year, Philadelphia won a key ruling in a lawsuit against it over a deadly January 2022 fire that started when an autistic child set fire to bugs crawling on a Christmas tree.
The estates of eight people who died sued the Philadelphia Housing Authority in 2024 through lawyers at Kline & Specter.
The complaint said PHA failed its policies of switching tenants in overcrowded apartments to bigger ones and addressing broken smoke detectors within 24 hours of notice.
That fire happened at a rental operated by the Philadelphia Housing Authority, which was found to have not created a “state-created danger” by allegedly falsifying reports and failing to follow through on a promise to install working smoke detectors.
