Fire in Converted Garage Burns Resident : Meiners Oaks: Officials say the 70-year-old man was smoking in bed at the board-and-care facility, which has been cited five times for safety and maintenance violations.

A 70-year-old man housed in a garage that had been converted to a bedroom set fire to his room while smoking in bed Thursday and was burned severely as he lay helpless in the Ojai Valley board-and-care facility, authorities said.

The smoke detector had been disconnected in Victor Rose’s room in the Shangri-La Guest Home in Meiners Oaks, and the fire was not detected until it blew out the windows in the converted garage, fire officials said.

Rose was listed in critical condition Thursday evening in the burn center of the Sherman Oaks Community Hospital, where he was transferred from the Ventura County Medical Center, a hospital spokesman said.

Second- and third-degree burns covered 90% to 95% of his body, said Norm Plott of the Ventura County Fire Department. Rose, whose nostrils and mouth were singed, also inhaled a great deal of smoke, Plott said.

“It was a very traumatic fire that the victim was not able to escape, and the only way he was able to get out was because of the efforts of the caretaker,” Plott said.

Caretakers at the residential home--which has been cited by the state five times this year for violations of safety and maintenance regulations--gave Rose a cigarette at 8 a.m., authorities said.

Rose probably fell asleep and either his clothing or the bedding caught on fire, Plott said. The man, who used a walker to get around, was probably unable to move quickly when he became aware of the flames, Plott said. The fire further incapacitated him, apparently imprisoning him in the bedroom.

The caretakers, who were in the main house, said they realized that something was wrong when they heard a loud bang about 9:25 a.m. That probably was the sound of windows bursting out from the fire’s extreme heat, Plott said.

Rose was pulled from the room by Alberto Trocio, 62, who tends the facility with his wife, Magdalena, 62.

Trocio said he was in the kitchen when he heard a loud sound from Rose’s room.

“We had just finished our breakfast in the kitchen and heard a big bang from his unit,” Trocio said. “I ran in there and the flames were already over him and his bed. I grabbed him and pulled him out.”

Trocio helped put out the fire on Rose’s body. He also tried to quench the flames in the bedroom, sustaining second-degree burns to his hands, Plott said. Trocio sought treatment from a private physician, Plott said.

Meanwhile, Magdalena Trocio said she and passersby in the neighborhood of well-tended houses helped usher three other residents from the house. Three more clients were housed in a separate building, Magdalena Trocio said.

John McCarty, 29, who lives a couple of blocks from the care home, said he was on his way to work when he saw the fire and pulled over to help.

“The guy was on fire,” he said. “His skin and hair was all on fire.”

McCarty said he helped pull Rose farther from the building and a couple of times put out the fire that threatened the man.

“I kept telling him, ‘Hang in there, buddy,’ ” McCarty said. “His eyes were open, and I think he heard me.”

An off-duty Ventura County sheriff’s deputy then rushed from his house across the street to offer first aid.

Deputy Rick Jones, who works at the Ojai station, said he had finished work at 7 a.m. and was asleep when his wife told him that there was a fire at the board-and-care facility and a man lying outside on fire.

With the help of another passerby, he pulled pieces of burning clothing from Rose’s body. When firefighters arrived with first-aid supplies, Jones, who formerly worked as an emergency medical technician, poured water on the burning man.

Rose was taken by helicopter to the Ventura County Medical Center as firefighters continued to investigate the blaze that caused $10,000 damage to the structure and a $2,000 loss in contents.

Rose, who formerly lived in Ventura, had been staying at the facility for about a year, Magdalena Trocio said.

The Ojai facility is one of three operated by Celestina Pascual, according to the state Department of Social Services Community Care Licensing Agency. The other two, which are licensed to house five people and six people, are in Simi Valley.

Pascual refused to comment.

The Ojai facility was cited by the state five times in 1990 for regulation violations, said Janet Seely, a licensing program analyst.

The agency, which licenses and monitors residential board-and-care facilities, cited the Ojai facility in June and in September for having a non-ambulatory person in a room that was cleared for fire safety only for ambulatory residents, authorities said.

Other citations were restraining a client in a chair, the malfunctioning of an emergency call signal in a client’s room and the absence of a ramp on the kitchen steps, Seely said.

Pascual received five other citations for a Simi Valley facility on Languid Lane. All of the citations in Pascual’s facilities were cleared, authorities said.

The state will investigate the fire, authorities said.

All clients were relocated to other facilities or relatives’ homes, said Ron Laux, supervisor of the state agency.

Thia Bell contributed to this story.