Boy, 4, Dies From Burns, Father Is Held

A 4-year-old boy who dreamed of becoming a firefighter died Tuesday night from burns suffered over most of his body, after his father allegedly set his mother’s hair on fire and torched her Granada Hills townhouse.

The boy, who had run to help his mother during the Monday night attack, was being treated at Torrance Memorial Hospital for third-degree burns over 73% of his body. His 32-year-old mother, whose name was not released, suffered abrasions and minor burns. She was released from the hospital.

Dwayne West, 29, was booked on suspicion of one count of murder and one count of attempted murder. He is being held in lieu of $1-million bail. West was recovering at Northridge Hospital Medical Center from burns to his hands and smoke inhalation.

The couple were arguing over child support earlier Monday and West left the townhouse, returning later that night and demanding to see his son, who was asleep, LAPD spokeswoman Ladonna Cissell said.

“The father went upstairs to the bedroom and began to choke the mother,” Cissell said. “He then took out [a container] of gasoline and poured it on the mother’s head” and lighted a match.

The boy, awakened by screaming, went to his mother. LAPD Capt. Charlie Beck said West grabbed the boy and threw him against a mirrored closet door, which shattered.

The woman, in flames, crawled out of the house. A neighbor rescued the boy from a burning bed. He was taken by helicopter to Childrens Hospital in Los Angeles before being transferred to Torrance.

Some residents of the complex in the 16800 block of San Fernando Mission Road said they heard the couple in violent arguments from time to time.

“They fought a lot,” said Josephine Fix, who was baby-sitting her grandchildren in a nearby townhouse when the fire started, about 10:30 p.m. “I heard quite a bit of yelling and then suddenly saw flames leaping over the roof. It was chaos out here.”

Next-door neighbor Pucci Pitts, 55, who has lived at the complex for nearly 14 years, said she saw the mother daily but never the little boy, until he was rushed into an ambulance late that night.

West ran a few blocks from the scene and called for an ambulance. Firefighters doused the fire within 20 minutes, leaving a pile of debris in front of the townhouse, its walls marked with black soot.

“This type of incident tears at the heart of investigators,” said Beck, head of the Police Department’s Juvenile Division. “[It’s] almost too much to bear.”

Only two weeks before the fire, the boy had met with a group of firefighters, whom he idolized. He donned a firefighter’s helmet and stood on a fire engine for the last photo taken before the fire.

“The little boy loved firemen,” said LAPD Lt. Dan Mulrenin, adding that a city Fire Department paramedic is a friend of the family’s. “And now look what happens to him.”

Times staff writers Michael Krikorian and Erin Park contributed to this story.