3 Die as Fire Sweeps Through Vacant Building
Three adult men--all of them thought to be transients--died early Tuesday when fire swept through the back of a vacant Los Angeles commercial building at Hope and 11th streets.
The coroner’s office said all three were too severely burned to permit immediate identification. The cause of the fire in the aging, one-story structure was not immediately determined.
Fire officials said nine engines responded to a call at 12:37 a.m. The fire was extinguished in about 40 minutes. Arson investigators searching through the rubble found the three bodies in an office at the rear of the building. Neighbors said as many as a dozen transients had been living there since an earlier blaze destroyed the front of the structure several months ago.
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