Thread: Mex. family dies in trailer home fire......

http://www.bnd.com/homepage/story/307214.html


Posted on Fri, Apr. 11, 2008
'My heart is destroyed': Survivor describes attempt to save his family from fire
BY LAURA GIRRESCH AND MARIA BARAN
News-Democrat



Ivan Olazaran-Gomez, the lone survivor of a mobile home fire that claimed the lives of his entire family, said Thursday he will recover physically, "but my heart is destroyed."



Olazaran-Gomez was released from the hospital Thursday after treatment for the deep cuts to his arms he suffered when he broke a window and escaped from his burning mobile home Tuesday, then broke other windows and tore at siding in attempt to rescue his family.



The blaze killed his wife, Olivia Jarillo-Gomez, 24, their children, Roman Gomez, 2, and Vanessa Gomez, 4, and his wife's uncle, Joseph Jose Garcia, 54. Their home at the HavaHome Mobile Home Park, 5100 Collinsville Road, burned shortly after 11:30 p.m. Tuesday. The family had moved in Saturday.



Olazaran-Gomez stood at the site of the fire Thursday and recounted in Spanish the details of his attempt to save his family. He spoke softly, looking down at the ground.



He said he doesn't know what could have started the fire: He and his wife were sleeping when he awoke to the sound of his son crying in the next room. He asked his wife to check on the child. When she opened the bedroom door, Olazaran-Gomez could see a big cloud of smoke. He and his wife tried to run to their children, but Jarillo-Gomez quickly was overcome with smoke and passed out. Olazaran-Gomez couldn't see through the smoke, which was moving farther into the bedrooms. The flames and his inability to see prevented him from reaching his wife and children.



Helpless against the fire and losing the ability to breathe, he broke a bedroom window and climbed out. Once outside, he broke out other windows, frantically trying to reach his family, and cutting up his arms in the process.



When emergency workers pulled him into an ambulance, he saw them carry his lifeless children out of the home.



"All I could think about was trying to get them out quickly," Olazaran-Gomez said. "It wasn't possible."



Police have said a second exit in the mobile home might have saved their lives had it been usable, but it had been covered over with siding in a remodeling that likely happened years ago.



Police said the Gomez family moved into the home Saturday after paying a down payment but before applying for an occupancy permit, which would have required that the mobile home be inspected. The inspection would have caught the walled-over door and the lack of a smoke detector, police said.



Lisa Oseguera, a manager at the HavaHome park, said that the mobile home was remodeled more than four years ago. She declined to release the name of the person selling the home to the Gomez family, but the most recent owner listed in St. Clair County records is Jose Pacheko, who apparently took residence there in 1999. Pacheko couldn't be reached for comment.



The 1969-version mobile home was the oldest in the park, Oseguera said. Out of 50, it was the only one that did not two exterior doors.



The Illinois State Fire Marshal was still investigating to determine the cause of the fire Thursday. Fairmont City Fire Chief Bob Belba, Mayor Alex Bregen, and Police Chief Scott Penny could not be reached for comment Thursday. Penny has said he does not know when the mobile home was last inspected.



Teressa Garcia, who is married to Olazaran-Gomez's cousin, said Thursday that Gomez's parents and two siblings are trying to cross the Mexican border -- Olazaran-Gomez and his family are from Zacatecas, Mexico -- into the U.S. to attend the funeral, but the family has not yet been able to afford plane tickets from Texas, and they are asking for the public's help to pay for them.



The relatives never got to meet 2-year-old Roman.



Olazaran-Gomez asks the public for help in whatever way possible -- through emotional support or donations; he doesn't have enough money to bury his family, he said.



"I don't have anything to give them peace," he said.



More than 100 people gathered for a candlelight vigil Thursday night outside the destroyed mobile home, near a makeshift memorial of flowers, notes and angel statues. Voices cracked with emotion as they sang hymns and recited prayers in Spanish and in English.



Neighbor Leticia Lopez said she has sons the age of Olazaran-Gomez. "He's here by himself; he doesn't have a shoulder to cry on," she said.



Felicitas Jarillo, of Fairmont City, brought 250 candles.



"We came to show respect," he said.



Olazaran-Gomez was able to save his wedding photos and photos of his daughter, but the pictures of his son were destroyed.



"I'm just going to have to get used to the idea that they're never going to be with me again," he said.



Contact reporter Laura Girresch at lgirresch@bnd.com or 239-2507 or reporter Maria Baran at mbaran@bnd.com or 239-2460.



© 2007 Belleville News-Democrat and wire service sources. All Rights Reserved. http://www.belleville.com

Man's life gutted by fire
By Angie Leventis and Elizabethe Holland
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
04/11/2008
Ivan Olizaran-Gomez
April,10,2008-- Ivan Olizaran-Gomez
(Dawn Majors/P-D)

FAIRMONT CITY --Ivan Olezaran-Gomez on Thursday walked through his charred mobile home for the first time since it took away everything he held dear.

White and blue siding was melted in eerie curves around the outer walls. The inside smelled like a sauna. Olezaran-Gomez, 25, sifted through the wreckage and ash, searching without success for a white cell phone.

He didn't say much. He mostly cried.
RELATED LINK
4 killed in mobile home blaze


Flames had engulfed the blue and white single-wide home late Tuesday while the family slept. The fire killed his children Vanessa, 4, and Roman, 2, as well as his wife, Olivia Jarillo-Gomez, 24, and her uncle Joseph Jose Garcia, 54. The Gomez family had opened the home to him after his wife had recently died of diabetes.
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Olezaran-Gomez was the lone survivor. He had escaped through a window and smashed the other windows from the outside to try and rescue the rest of his family. He suffered cuts and burns but was released from St. John's Mercy Medical Center in Creve Coeur just before noon on Thursday.

The Mexican immigrant said, through an interpreter, that he would be staying with family, though he wasn't sure which relatives were going to take him in. He said he's lived in Fairmont City for 14 years and works as a machine operator.

His cousin, Anthony Reyes, the interpreter, said Olezaran-Gomez is holding it together, "but once he starts talking about it and thinking about it, it seems to hit him."

Police say the fire likely started in the kitchen and was an accident, but they have not released the cause.

The family could not escape because one of two exits was boarded shut with vinyl siding. Authorities said there were no smoke or carbon monoxide detectors.

Police had said that the lack of an exit and detectors violates city code, but the problem never surfaced because the Gomez family didn't seek an occupancy permit, which triggers an inspection.

Olezaran-Gomez said through the interpreter that he didn't even know there was a second door — the family thought it was just a wall. He also said he didn't know he needed an occupancy permit.

The mobile home is one of 60 in the HavaHome Mobile Home Park on Collinsville Road. Owners of HavaHome could not be reached for comment, nor was there a manager in the on-site office on Wednesday or Thursday.

The Gomez family moved into the home on Saturday, after paying a $1,500 down payment for the $5,000 residence. Documents from the Illinois secretary of state's office say the mobile home is owned by a woman with an East St. Louis mailing address. She could not be reached for comment.

The smell of smoke still filled the air around the mobile home on Thursday evening when a few hundred people gathered in front of it for a candlelight vigil.

"The Mexican community will always come out to help," said Teressa Garcia, a cousin to the family.

The crowd recited the rosary in Spanish, sang and prayed some more. Many held candles as they cried and added flowers and crosses to the makeshift memorial in front of the home.

Ivan Olezaran-Gomez walked among the crowd, sometimes talking to people and other times standing in silence.

"I think he's numb," said Dawn Rodriguez-Garcia, whose husband is a cousin to Olezaran-Gomez. "He hasn't had time to soak it all in."

Visitation for those killed in the fire will be from 4 to 8 p.m. today at Kassly Mortuary in Fairview Heights. The funeral Mass will be celebrated at 10 a.m. Saturday at Holy Rosary Catholic Church in Fairmont City, followed by interment at Mount Carmel Cemetery in Belleville.

Greg Jonsson, Nicholas J.C. Pistor and Leah Thorsen of the Post-Dispatch contributed to this report.
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There are so many people out there who prey on illegal aliens when it comes to housing, because they KNOW that illegals will take just about anything and not complain.

The saddest part is that people in this incident and many others like this have lost their lives because of it. Our previous landlord here was this way too, he NEVER checked on anything and because the illegals in the complex buildings would not complain about problems with appliances, heaters, outlets or fixtures, at any given time a fire could have occured and taken lives.

This is a really sad story.