Trial By Fire

Poor Scott Miller just can’t get a break. During the 1992 Los Angeles riots, the Los Angeles city firefighter was shot in the face while rushing from one blaze to another.

Two years later, misfortune struck Miller again when the Northridge earthquake wrecked his Granada Hills home.

And early Friday morning, Miller was hoisting a garden hose outside his new four-bedroom house in Newbury Park, watching hopelessly as a fire destroyed many of his family’s belongings.

“I guess this is a really big deal because of what has happened to me in the past, huh?” Miller asked Friday as a phalanx of television media crews descended on his tranquil neighborhood. “But we’re going to do what any family would do if they were in our situation: We’re going to move on.

“I’ve learned that’s all you can really do.”

Thanks in large part to the quick response of Miller’s neighbors--including actor Casey Sander of television’s “Grace Under Fire,” who ran across the street and punched Miller’s living room window trying to save the family. Neither Miller nor his wife and two children were harmed. Ventura County Fire Department arson investigators by late Friday still had not determined the cause of the blaze, which apparently began in the family’s garage about 12:30 a.m., according to witnesses. The home suffered $85,000 damage to its structure and contents, according to fire officials.

“I just came running outside, I looked and it was roaring and popping in the garage,” said Sander, who invited the Millers to spend the night in his home. “I just went running into the front door and smashed the window.”

Unbeknownst then to Sander, Miller and his family had escaped the fire and were in their backyard.

“They’re terrific people,” Sander said, his forearm slightly injured from his heroics. “I don’t think anything of it, really. I know they would have done the same for me.”

Bad luck and tragedy have seemingly followed the 37-year-old Miller for years. During the riots, he was piloting a hook-and-ladder through the flames of Western Avenue when a gunman pulled up beside the firetruck and fired, hitting him in the right cheek and severing his carotid artery.

He was the most severely injured of all the authorities who responded to the riots. Doctors warned him that he might never talk or walk again, and he received an outpouring of support from people throughout the nation.

The gunman, Thurman Ivory Woods, pleaded no contest and received a 16-year jail sentence. Miller said at the time that although he could never forgive his attacker, he was not going to let the incident turn him into a bitter man. The First A.M.E. Church honored Miller as an example of tolerance.

The fire captain fought back from his injuries, eventually regaining the ability to talk and move freely. But his left hand will never be the same, he said, and his voice is slightly scratchy and muted. He now works as an inspector of high-rise buildings for the city’s Fire Prevention Bureau in downtown Los Angeles.

“That was a very difficult time for my family,” Miller said. “Thanks to the support of everyone around me, I overcame all of it.”

When the Northridge earthquake shook his home--cracking its foundation--in January 1994, Miller said, he thought little about his own cruel fate, considering that “some of my neighbors’ houses completely fell down.” He took his insurance settlement and moved to quiet Pacific Circle in Newbury Park shortly afterward.

Miller said he went to his refrigerator Thursday night to grab a drink, then went to bed. Two hours later, he was awakened by the screams of his neighbors, who spotted a rapidly moving fire in his garage and rushed into the street to help.

Rachel Kahn, Sander’s live-in nanny, was the first to notice something was wrong. She awoke after midnight to a loud rattle and got up to peer outside, believing someone was vandalizing a car.

“Then I hear a big pop,” she said. “I ran to the front door and I saw the house in flames. It was coming from the garage.”

She called 911 and woke up Sander, who ran across the street and attempted to get the Millers’ attention by breaking their front window. By that time, the family had heard the cries of other neighbors and escaped with their dog, Topper.

Late Friday morning, as the mass of onlookers, camera crews and insurance adjusters began to clear, Miller and his wife, Kathi, began trying to salvage what they could from their charred home. Their children, 9-year-old Ryan and 7-year-old Julianne, were off at Maple School.

“I’m just glad they’re safe,” Kathi Miller said. “That’s probably the best place for them right now. The other kids think this is really cool.”

The family’s 1992 Ford Explorer and 1984 Buick Century were burned beyond repair. The photographs of relatives were not coming down any time soon--they were stuck to the walls with earthquake glue.

But there were signs of hope. Julianne’s photo album, one of the things she lamented most when grieving over the fire’s toll with her parents, had survived intact. So had her Bobby Sox uniform, which the Millers plan to have cleaned in time for today’s game.

“My family is safe, and we’re going to adjust,” Miller said. “We’re going to be all right from this too.”