Former Hotel Resident Held in Arson Threats

A disgruntled former resident of a Downtown tenement that burned in a fatal arson fire was arrested Tuesday for allegedly threatening to set fire to the building, according to police.

As the arrest of 35-year-old Julio Garcia was announced, a co-owner of the burned building alleged that police ignored a complaint last month that Garcia had threatened to set fire to the structure. Police are investigating the matter.

Garcia was arrested at a Skid Row hotel early Tuesday for allegedly making a terrorist threat to burn down the old residential hotel at 1120 S. Grand Ave., where three people died and 19 were injured Monday.

Police consider Garcia a suspect in the arson-homicide case, but emphasized that for the time being, he is being charged only with making a threat.

“He is a prime suspect for the arson,” said Detective Lawrence Garrett. “We’re just not charging him at this point in time.”

Socorro Ramirez, a co-owner of the run-down structure, said Garcia threatened to burn the building when he was told Oct. 30 that he was going to be evicted for failure to pay his rent.

She said that her daughter, Donna Ramirez, called 911 to report the threat but that a police dispatcher said to call back if Garcia took any action.

In an interview, Donna Ramirez said, “I told them that this Julio Garcia guy was threatening to burn the building if we evicted him. They never came down. They said that if anything happens, call 911.”

Garcia left the building several hours after the alleged threat, leaving his personal belongings in his second-story room, according to the co-owner.

“This (fire) might not have happened if they arrested him,” Socorro Ramirez said.

Police said they were planning to go over tape-recordings of 911 calls to determine what happened. “I don’t know who to fault--her or us,” Garrett said. “I’m going to have to listen to the (dispatch) tapes.

“We need to listen to see what her exact wording was to see if it was clear to dispatch,” Garrett said.

He also said dispatchers may have been overwhelmed with higher-priority emergency calls and not been able to send units to the apartment to investigate. “It could have been an awful busy day,” he said.

The Times requested access to the tapes, but officials said they were not immediately available.

Officer Art Holmes, a Police Department spokesman, said dispatchers are required to send a patrol car if a suspect making such threats is at the scene. If the suspect has gone, he said, the dispatcher should either take a report over the telephone, instruct the caller to go to the nearest police station or send a non-emergency patrol unit to the scene.

“If that person is there, we will send somebody out,” Holmes said. “And even if that person is gone, we will still take a report. That’s a serious threat.”

Garcia, who was wanted for failure to appear in court in March on an attempted burglary charge, is being held on a $110,000 bond at Parker Center Jail.

Police, who were seeking Garcia’s female companion for questioning, refused to say whether he has any other criminal background.

Officers said Garcia lived at the Grand Avenue hotel for several months before he was evicted.

The son of another co-owner of the building said Garcia also had threatened to set fire to the structure during a dispute over rent last winter.

Mario Zamorano, son of co-owner Joe Zamorano, said Garcia threatened to burn down the building in January after the two argued about Garcia’s past-due rent. “He said he was going to burn the building down and make problems for us,” Zamorano said.

The City Council offered a $25,000 reward for information leading to a conviction in the fire--the second multiple-fatality blaze in the city this year. A suspicious fire in the Westlake district near Downtown killed 10 residents May 3.

“This cruel arson is another horrendous crime that affronts our entire community and is an atrocity which must not go unpunished,” said the measure, written by Councilwoman Rita Walters, who represents the area where Monday’s fire occurred.

Los Angeles fire officials, who completed an investigation of the blaze Tuesday, said that the building owners would be cited for three safety violations but that the infractions did not contribute to any of the deaths, nor was it likely that they contributed to any of the injuries.

Investigators found an inoperable fire escape ladder at the front of the building, but said residents at that end of the structure were able to get out through a stairwell or were rescued by firefighters.

Fire officials also found that three smoke detectors were dangling from wires and that a few were covered with plastic bags to prevent kitchen smoke from setting them off, but the majority that had not melted in the blaze were operable.

Investigators also found a locked exit door on one side of the first floor, but noted that the fire was confined to the second floor, where the fatalities occurred.

Although most of the residents of the building speak Spanish, fire safety instructions in the building were only posted in English.

But Fire Capt. Stephen Ruda said that because the building has fewer than three stories, the owners are not required to post the instructions in Spanish.

Those killed in the blaze were Jose Romero Ventura, 46, Elsa Casillas, 40, and her sister, Rebecca Salazar, 61.

Some of those who were injured remained hospitalized.

They included Juan Fuentes, 40, and his daughter, Jessica Moreno, 14, both in good condition at County-USC Medical Center.

Fuentes’ 2-year-old son, Gerald, remained in critical condition.

At the UC Irvine burn center, Francisco Mejia, 44, was in critical condition.

At Good Samaritan Hospital, Melina Moreno, 25, and Rosario Angeles, 25, were both in critical condition and Juan Pedro, 18, was in stable condition.

At Sherman Oaks Community Hospital burn center, Martina Landa, 41, and Juan Jose Fuentes, 9, were in critical condition.

An unidentified 5-year-old boy was in stable condition at Northridge Hospital Medical Center.