Fire Kills Man in Skid Row Apartment

A 53-year-old man died early Monday after a fire engulfed his one-room apartment in a three-story Skid Row apartment building run by the Volunteers of America, fire officials said.

Elmer Graham, described by friends as a loner, suffered third-degree burns on more than 70% of his body and sustained smoke inhalation, said Los Angeles City Fire Department spokesman Gary Jenkins.

When firefighters arrived at the 270-unit Ballington Plaza in the 600 block of Wall Street just before 6 a.m., Graham was already dead, Jenkins said. He was found lying on the floor in front of his bed.

Authorities said the fire may have started in overstuffed furniture, but the cause of the blaze is under investigation. A team of 30 firefighters put out the fire in less than 15 minutes, officials said.

No other injuries were reported in the blaze, which caused an estimated $7,000 in damage, officials said.

Some residents of the four-building complex complained about broken smoke alarms in the building where Graham lived. Had the smoke alarm gone off, Graham--a former carpenter who lived on disability benefits--may have survived, they said.

But the apartment’s management said the fire alarm did not go off because Graham had tampered with the smoke detector.

Fire officials have not determined whether the alarm worked, Jenkins said.

Joe Clark, who said he lived in the same building, recalled that when his room caught fire a year ago, the smoke alarm did not go off.

“They still have to fix the fire alarms in that building,” he said. “It’s a shame.”

Glenda Garcia, the apartment’s manager, acknowledged that there had been a fire in the same building. But she claimed Graham had taped up the smoke detector in his room.

Garcia claimed that is a common practice among residents who smoke crack cocaine inside their rooms.

“These people tend to cover up the alarm to cover up other things they’re doing,” Garcia said.

Clark was among the last people to have seen Graham, a Tennessee native who had moved to Los Angeles as a young man.

“We were just shooting the breeze out here yesterday,” said Clark. “He liked wearing hats. He had a black cowboy hat on yesterday.

“He was a real quiet fellow, stayed to himself a lot. For the last four or five days though, he was drinking a lot . . . From the first time I met him until about four days ago, I had never seen him drink.”

Clark said that while he did not know why Graham had been drinking heavily last week, he suspected his friend was depressed.

Authorities have not been able to find Graham’s relatives, said coroner’s spokesman Scott Carrier.

Meanwhile, Ballington Plaza resident Linda Lawson was combing the streets, trying to find someone who may have known Graham’s family members.

“He’s going to be well missed around here,” she said.