He Faces 7-Year Prison Term for Hotel Fire : China Trial Hears American’s Plea

Three months ago, five visiting North Koreans and four Chinese hotel workers leaped to their deaths and a Chinese-American businessman died of asphyxiation when a midnight fire swept through the 11th floor of the recently constructed Swan Hotel here.

On Tuesday, Richard S. Ondrik, another American businessmen in the hotel that night, made a dramatic plea in his own defense on the closing day of an extraordinary Chinese criminal trial at which he is being accused of causing the fire by negligently smoking in bed.

“It is difficult to think of myself as a criminal,” Ondrik, 34, an oil industry expert, told the three-judge panel hearing the case. “That is because the law of my country and that of China concerning such an accident are different.”

In a closing statement to the judges, the first full public accounting he has given since his arrest, Ondrik did not specifically deny smoking in bed. Instead, he said he does not generally do so but cannot recall whether he smoked in bed on the night of the fire.

Anger Made Known

Ondrik also told the tribunal and a courtroom full of Chinese spectators he was made “very angry” by testimony about the failure of the hotel management to take proper fire precautions.

“If there had been a smoke alarm, a fire alarm or anyone (from the hotel staff) on the floor, it would only have been a tiny room fire,” said Ondrik, sitting alone at a table on the stage of an auditorium in this Northeast China city where the trial is being held.

Ondrik, a representative of a Hong Kong firm called Energy Projects, Southeast Asia Ltd., was detained by Chinese authorities and barred from leaving Harbin a few days after the April 18 fire. On June 26, he was formally arrested and held in the local detention center.

He is charged with violating a provision of Chinese criminal law that prohibits “negligently” setting a fire that results in death, serious injuries or major property losses. If convicted, he could be sentenced to up to seven years in jail.

In a civil action being heard at the same time, Chinese prosecutors are also seeking to recover approximately 250,000 yuan (about $90,000) in compensation from Ondrik for the hotel damage caused by the fire. The judges are expected to announce a decision within the next three weeks.

Two lower-level Chinese hotel employees are also being prosecuted on charges of dereliction of duty. One, Zhang Guoyun, the night supervisor in charge of security for the hotel, admitted he had been drinking on duty and failed to combat the fire. The other, a floor attendant named Gu Su, confessed he had been away on another floor taking a bath. They could be sentenced to up to five years in prison.

‘Serious Problems’

Summing up the state’s case against Ondrik on Tuesday, prosecutor Zhang Weixiao admitted that the Swan Hotel “had some serious problems in fire protection.” And he urged the judges to give Ondrik “some lesser punishment” than the seven-year maximum.

Nevertheless, the Chinese prosecutor said Ondrik “is the person who is directly responsible for the fire.”

According to the prosecution, fire investigators found that Ondrik’s hotel room was the only one where the burn marks showed the fire moving from inside out. Prosecutors cited evidence showing that Ondrik’s sports jacket and the bedspread were charred and stuck together.

Ondrik, dressed in a pale blue suit with no tie, read his plea to the court from notes he had written in the jail cell he shares with a Chinese inmate. There were loud murmurs among the Chinese spectators when he said his greatest regret was for the death of his fellow American businessman, Alan Eng.

‘Always Blame Myself’

“I grieve for those who died, for those who were trapped in the building, but most of all for my friend and co-worker Alan Eng,” he said. “I shall always blame myself for not being strong enough to fight through the smoke and lead my friend to safety.”

Ondrik said he finds it “hard to believe that on that tragic night, I did something I had never done before, to lay down on the bed while smoking, but I am neither a fire expert nor is my memory clear enough after the shock of the fire to remember. The court will have to decide that.”

Regarding the Chinese request for nearly $90,000 in damages, Ondrik told the judges, “I hope you will remember that it is not my family, my friends, my company or my country that is on trial here, but only me. I am not a rich foreign tourist here to see the Great Wall, but a man who earns his salary working each day in your country.”