Four San Diego fire refugees die in last two days

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Four San Diego County refugees have died in the last two days, including two who were being moved from medical facilities, a county medical examiner official said.

Donald Swarting, 92, was being prepared for evacuation overnight from Mount Miguel Covenant Village Health Facility in Spring Valley when he complained of shortness of breath and chest pain, said Rick Poggemeyer, operations administrator for the medical examiner’s office. Swarting was helped to the bathroom and became unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at 4:50 a.m.

On Monday, 91-year-old Alla Robinson stopped breathing en route to Tri-City Medical Center in Oceanside, which was accepting people evacuated from Fallbrook Hospital. She was pronounced dead at 3:30 p.m.

Separately, Poggemeyer said, a 62-year-old woman who had been evacuated from her Rancho Bernardo home died Monday night of head trauma after falling down and hitting her head. Suzanne Casey had initially gone to Qualcomm Stadium, then to a hotel in Pacific Beach. The fall happened as she was leaving a restaurant next to the hotel.

And 95-year-old June Brewer was found dead around 7:20 a.m. in a hotel in Old Town San Diego. She had been evacuated Monday from her Rancho Bernardo home.

-- Charles Ornstein