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Fort Wayne fire and city officials are keeping more than 150 documents and records related to the Jan. 23 blaze that killed three International Business College students at the Willows of Coventry apartment complex from public view.
A recent court filing in Allen Superior Court, though, sheds some light on what those documents contain, including an allegation of firefighter misconduct at the scene and that emergency dispatch apparently was on the phone with one of the victims for nearly 30 minutes while she was trapped in her bathroom.
The unreleased records also seem to confirm that the fire originated from an electrical outlet in a first-floor apartment, directly below where the three students were trapped on the second floor.
The list stems from an ongoing battle between city officials and attorneys for those affected by the fire over records compiled immediately afterward.
The city has declined to release the majority of the records pertaining to the fire, claiming the records are investigatory in nature.
Descriptions and summaries of the documents show:
• Renea Patton, one of the victims in the fire, at some point called emergency dispatch to report a fire in a stairwell. She then called again from a bathroom where she and her roommates, Lara Punches and Jennifer Spurgeon, were trapped until firefighters pulled them unconscious from the apartment. The list filed by the city reflects that the record pertaining to Patton’s call is 29 minutes and 50 seconds, but it is unclear how long her call lasted.
•The parents of Patton, Punches and Spurgeon called emergency dispatchers with several area agencies, including one in Defiance, Ohio, reporting the fire. The records seem to indicate they were transferred several times to other dispatchers.
•Observation reports written by 20 different firefighters are being withheld, along with written notes made by officials at the scene and emergency calls from residents in other apartments reporting the fire. The Fort Wayne communications call log between 5:07 a.m. and 5:24 a.m., while the fire was burning, is also being withheld.
•Philip Grimme, a private with the fire department at the time, was accused of misconduct at the scene. Fire Chief Pete Kelly said Grimme’s actions resulted in a brief investigation and resulted in no discipline. Kelly declined to reveal what he thought Grimme did, only that it did not affect the fighting of the fire.
“It was just an internal thing between a couple of firefighters,” Kelly said.
Grimme, who could not be reached for comment Friday, resigned one month shy of his 10-year anniversary with the department in March.
Summaries of the city records were made at the request of Cal Miller, the local attorney for Dial Equities, Inc., which owns the Willows of Coventry.
Several entities are trying to complete investigations into the fire to determine whether lawsuits will be filed. In May, Miller and attorneys representing Bradford Schools Inc., which is the parent company of International Business College, Northern Indiana Public Services Company, and a family of one of the victims, asked an Allen Superior Court judge to force the city to release the records.
As part of the court process, the city was required to make a log of all records or documents it claims it does not have to release and cite the reasons for not releasing those records under Indiana law.
The fire began in the early morning of Jan. 23, the third serious fire in four months at the apartment complex just off of Coventry Lane near Interstate 69. A fire report shows the first crews, from nearby fire houses in the Aboite Township area, were dispatched at 5:06 a.m. and arrived on the scene about 5:13 a.m.
Rescue 1, a rescue crew from the downtown fire house on Main Street roughly eight miles from the Willows, was also dispatched about 5:06 a.m. And despite the presence of other fire crews on the scene, it was Rescue 1 that ended up going into the burning apartment and pulling the three women out of the bathroom, according to the report.
The first two crews on scene encountered heavy smoke and fire and were unable to get into the building, but they set up hose lines and ladders, Kelly said.
When Rescue 1 arrived, a chimney had either collapsed or vented itself, improving visibility and creating a brief window of opportunity that allowed Rescue 1’s firefighters to enter the second story apartment on the ladders already in place, Kelly said.
Previously released documents show Rescue 1’s arrival time listed as 7:08 a.m. – more than two hours from when it was called out. But Kelly said the discrepancy is likely from an oversight at the scene, adding the crew actually arrived within minutes.
International Business College, just blocks away from the complex, rented units from the Willows to use as dorms.
Spurgeon, a 19-year-old from Winamac, was declared brain-dead at a local hospital and died a day later, leaving her organs for donation. Patton, an 18-year-old from Ottawa, Ohio, died three days after the fire. Punches, 19, of Defiance, Ohio, was hospitalized for three weeks before succumbing to her injuries Feb. 12.
All three died from smoke inhalation, according to the Allen County Coroner.
The next step will be an evaluation by Miller and the other attorneys into the city’s reasons for keeping certain records and information secret. That evaluation may likely involve the city releasing some documents to the lawyers “informally,” Miller said.
“We intend to file formal briefings about what wasn’t produced, particularly the (911) communications and dispatch times,” Miller said.
