Nightclub victims’ kin: Oakland fire families face long road

In both fires, there was a lack of proper permits and loads of highly flammable material inside. In both, the operators were accused of ignoring safety standards, such as providing adequate fire exits. As in Rhode Island, there are suggestions that officials in Oakland didn’t do enough to inspect and monitor the building, leading to the deadliest fire in the U.S. since the 2003 blaze.

At The Station, inspectors failed to note the foam in their reports. They also raised the club’s capacity, so people were allowed to pack inside.

A nearly 10-month grand jury investigation resulted in involuntary manslaughter charges for three people: the club’s owners, Jeffrey and Michael Derderian, and the man who set off the pyrotechnics, Great White tour manager Daniel Biechele.

But many were outraged that the town’s fire marshal and Great White leader Jack Russell were not charged.

Dave Kane, whose son, Nicholas O’Neill, died in The Station fire, said he believes he is seeing in Oakland what he saw in Rhode Island: a rush to blame the operator of the space and to protect public officials.

“The elected officials, the fire officials, they’re the responsible ones,” Kane said, adding a message to families in Oakland: “Don’t get your hopes up, because too many people have to cover themselves, and that’s the problem.”

Jeff Pine, a former Rhode Island attorney general who represented Jeffrey Derderian, said The Station fire represented a “perfect storm” of things going wrong simultaneously.

In such cases, when there is no malicious conduct or criminal intent, manslaughter is more likely, he said. Authorities said Wednesday there is no evidence of arson.

But Robert Weisberg, a Stanford law professor, said under California law, second-degree murder could be proved if a person knows there is an extreme risk of death and goes forward anyway for selfish reasons.

“They’re hard to win, but it’s legally plausible,” he said.

Tom Briody, who defended Biechele, said establishing criminal intent is a high burden, but there is a tendency to lower it when so many people are killed.

“The reality is that when you have a large death toll, the cases get investigated more aggressively. Ultimately, I think the burden somehow lowers itself,” he said. “Somehow, it becomes a lot easier to convince folks that someone’s to blame than when there’s a smaller amount of damage or harm.”

Alameda County District Attorney Nancy O’Malley has said Oakland investigators are looking into “Who knew what? Who ignored what, and who completely disregarded what?”

Warehouse operator Derick Ion Almena deflected questions from NBC’s “Today” about whether he should be held accountable, but said he signed a lease for building that was “to city standards, supposedly,” and said his three children slept there at night. The night of the fire they were staying at a hotel.

Biechele ultimately pleaded guilty to 100 counts of involuntary manslaughter and served less than two years in prison. The Derderians pleaded no contest to the same charges without admitting guilt. Michael Derderian spent less than three years in prison, and Jeffrey Derderian got community service.

“That was rather devastating,” said Chris Fointaine, whose son, Mark, died, and whose daughter was badly injured. “The fact that one brother walked away with basically no time, and the other with what we considered a slap on the wrist.”

She said relatives of those killed became their own sort of family and drew support from each other in the years that followed.

“They need to be prepared for this to be dragging for a long, long time,” she said of the families in Oakland. “I think the only comfort that we found was in each other.”

In Rhode Island, the criminal case took more three years, and the civil cases against dozens of people and companies took six. The settlements totalled $176 million.

Fontaine called those settlements the most insignificant thing that happened in the case.

“To me, that was the least important. To me, seeing justice served would have been the most helpful,” she said. “We never got that justice served. And we never will.”

Michelle R. Smith, The Associated Press

by Canadian Press

Nightclub victims’ kin: Oakland fire families face long road

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