A Different Kind of Case for LAPD Homicide Detectives

It’s not as if the homicide detectives can haul their current suspect into an interrogation room, or sweat the culprit like so many others, offering a deal in exchange for a confession or catching the perpetrator in a web of lies.

This time, the “suspect” in the LAPD investigation is an apartment complex--the aging Echo Park building that suddenly collapsed early Dec. 8, killing one tenant and injuring 36.

The case is a whodunit, but an unusual one for detectives more attuned to fingering live suspects believed responsible for the lifeless body at the crime scene.

For the last week, detectives in the LAPD’s elite Robbery/Homicide Division have been hovering about the 76-year-old building, trying to ascertain exactly what caused it to shift, buckle and then collapse in places, burying 32-year-old Francisco Pineda in a pile of rubble.

And they are investigating whether shoddy construction, neglect by the complex’s managers and owners or lax oversight by city building inspectors might have played a role in the collapse. Such problems could make those people liable for criminal negligence charges, perhaps even manslaughter, authorities said.

“It is sort of uncharted ground here for a lot of people--I don’t think we’ve ever endeavored to have this kind of investigation before,” said Sgt. John Pasquariello, a department spokesman. “Normally, we’re the forensic experts at the crime scene.”

Not this time.

In this situation, “we’re leading it,” Pasquariello said of the homicide squad, “but we don’t have the expertise. So we’re getting help.”

That comes in the form of experts from the city’s Building and Safety Department who are familiar with apartment construction--and destruction--as well as Fire Department officials, structural and soils engineers, slum housing lawyers and others.

They’re all helping the detectives discern what clues to look for--and what questions to ask--in determining if anyone should be criminally charged.

Such a course of action is extremely rare; only a few such cases have been filed nationwide.

Terence Hallinan, San Francisco’s district attorney, launched one of only a handful of building-related criminal prosecutions in 1996, after a fourth-floor balcony snapped and plunged 30 feet to the ground during a cocktail party. Mary Ellen Slane, 32, was killed; 14 others were injured.

Hallinan, who prosecuted the case personally, said he had landlord Randall J. Nathan indicted on felony manslaughter charges, alleging egregious neglect of the building and dangerous conditions there. The jury deadlocked, and Nathan ultimately was convicted of misdemeanor building-code violations.

“It’s high-tech gumshoe work,” Hallinan said Friday.

And, he added, very complicated.

The LAPD’s investigators know that. But they’re undaunted.

“Somebody died,” said Lt. Clay Farrell, “and we are looking into why they died and whether anybody has any responsibility.”

Processing a Litany of Tenants’ Complaints

Los Angeles police officials put up yellow crime scene tape around the complex within hours of the collapse. By the next morning, city officials at the site had determined that the Robbery/Homicide Division should take control of the “crime scene,” given the unit’s experience in handling complex investigations with a lot of moving parts.

Over several days, 10 or so detectives interviewed more than 70 tenants, taking detailed statements about conditions inside and outside the apartment complex, about why they thought it collapsed and about the conduct of its owners and managers.

Detectives processed a litany of complaints--about leaky pipes, odd noises, spreading cracks and doors that would not close in the days before the collapse. One tenant said she was on the phone with the city, complaining that the building was trembling, when the collapse occurred.

Detectives are also tracing the history of the building, to see when it was inspected, what problems were found and what was done about them.

They’ve talked to the building manager, Felipe Ordonez. He denied being aware of any significant structural weaknesses and said he immediately responded to tenants’ complaints.

Meanwhile, police and city officials have tried to trace ownership of the building, hitting an apparent dead end when it appeared that the former landlord, City Properties, had deeded the property to a tenant, Desiderio Martinez, for $90,000 or less last year. That raised suspicions, since the building’s value was recently assessed at more than $576,000.

At the time, L.A. officials were ordering City Properties--and principals Barry, Dan and Stan Wallman--to fix a crack in the building’s foundation that had been found the previous year during an inspection.

“We’ve been telling them to fix this place for so long, but we always get the same answer,” tenant Ana Avila said after the collapse. “It’s always, ‘Tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow.’ Is this what it takes to get it fixed? It took a life.”

Authorities said Friday that they are still trying to determine whether the Wallmans are secretly managing the building and maintain some kind of hidden ownership of it, and that they hope to talk to them and Martinez soon.

Suspicions were raised even further when authorities determined that Dan Wallman had paid $565 for a permit to do the repair work on the foundation weeks after the building had been “sold” to Martinez, sources said Friday.

The Wallmans, who have declined to comment, have extensive apartment complex holdings throughout Los Angeles, and have been the target of at least two lawsuits alleging substandard conditions in other buildings.

For now, Farrell cautioned, police have no “inherent assumption of criminal culpability.”

But they are looking for evidence of what he calls “negligent criminal conduct, as in failures in the structure over a period of time that led to a degradation of the structural integrity of the building.”

“Potentially that is criminal conduct,” Farrell said, as would be failure of the owners and the city to correct them. “But it also could have been an error, unforeseen circumstances, [such as] failures that over the years no one was aware of, or even an act of God.”

In recent days the focus of the investigation has shifted to the building itself.

Initially, the half-toppled wreckage posed such a danger that authorities wouldn’t allow coroner’s crews in to retrieve Pineda’s body. But the structure has been shored up to allow the investigation to proceed.

For eight days, teams of detectives have been working the crime scene from dawn until past dusk.

Pieces of the Building Slowly Stripped Away

On Friday, Det. Wally Tennelle monitored the operation as workers used heavy equipment to slowly strip away pieces of the two-story stucco and wood structure.

It is a slow, methodical (read: boring) and time-consuming process.

Tennelle watched carefully, as the pieces were peeled away like layers of an onion. He peered into the structure carefully, asking questions, taking notes, fidgeting with his hard hat.

Like other detectives, he was on a particular lookout for signs of disrepair and neglect. Some pieces are discarded. But others are claimed as evidence--and poked, prodded and pored over by the cops and experts. A few are sent to labs for analysis, to look for tell-tale clues that could indicate whether they helped cause the collapse.

The process, known as forensic deconstruction, ultimately could take months because of lab tests, said Marvin Specter, executive director of the National Academy of Forensic Engineers.

Once the structure is removed, police and their support staff of experts plan to scrutinize the foundation of the building, and the footing--rebar encased in concrete--to see if it has shifted.

The reason: A Building and Safety inspector two years ago examined the Spanish-style structure and found the crack in the southwest corner of its foundation, but one that was not immediately deemed life-threatening.

After months dragged on and the repairs were not made, the Wallmans were hauled before a city hearing officer last year. Ultimately, the repairs were made and signed off on by city inspectors.

Officials have stopped short of connecting the prior damage to the collapse.

But because the collapse appears to have started near the southern portion of the building, authorities said, they are eager to review the area.

Building and Safety officials have interviewed inspector John De LaBretoniere, who signed off on the repairs, as well as another inspector who had been to the complex in recent years.

De LaBretoniere’s internal field files, obtained by The Times, show that he made three notations during visits to the site, including one that the concrete was safe to pour and another that the work appeared to have been done correctly.

“We reviewed the notes, and asked him to clarify the notes, and we’re satisfied that all work was done according to the approved plan,” said Building and Safety spokesman Bob Steinbach.

Sources close to the investigation said last week that few, if any, other violations were found at the building in recent years. Investigators will now look to see whether that was because of good maintenance or a lack of aggressive inspections.

Steinbach said the threshold for filing criminal charges against any negligent landlord is prohibitively high.

Los Angeles prosecutors have considered filing manslaughter charges against a landlord only once in recent years, after a baby fell down an open elevator shaft and died, Steinbach said. Authorities believed they couldn’t prove intentional neglect, or even negligence, and ended up filing only violations of the city building code.

‘Not Overlooking Anything’

“You need to find some degree of culpability,” Steinbach said. “It depends on what the violations [were] and whether they were ignored.”

The standards are even higher for city inspectors, officials said, especially if, as in this case, it appears they personally reviewed repair work before signing off on it.

Farrell agreed, saying police have no plans to question inspectors--unless the investigation suggests that a shift in the foundation where the crack was located helped trigger the collapse.

Nevertheless, “we’re not overlooking anything. If [the investigation] points to some inspector that is negligent, that he knowingly signed off on a building that he knew was a life-threatening hazard, that could be a criminal act,” Sgt. Pasquariello said. “I’m not saying that happened. But a building collapsed and somebody died. And we have to determine if somebody is responsible for that.”

Ultimately, “it may not be criminal,” he added. But, “at the end of this whole thing we are going to find out why that building collapsed and who is responsible, if anyone.”