Taichung prosecutors on Friday indicted a landlord and tenant who they say are responsible for a apartment complex fire that killed six people and injured six others on March 6.
Prosecutors charged the tenant, surnamed Cheng (鄭), with homicide and offenses related to endangering public safety for deliberately setting the building ablaze, and the landlord, surnamed Chuang (莊), with offenses related to endangering public safety and causing deaths by obstructing fire escape routes in the building with flammable items.
Cheng had previously told police that he had set a pile of recycled items on fire in a communal area of the building near an elevator.
He said that he started the fire because Chuang was allegedly attempting to evict him for keeping a pet goat and owing NT$6,000 in rent.
The prosecutors’ indictment said that since moving into his rental unit, which was a rooftop add-on to the original building, Cheng had upset Chuang by vandalizing door locks and leaving hot water running.
Other tenants had hygiene issues with Cheng’s pet goat, it said.
The indictment against Chuang said that she had a history of hoarding and building management negligence.
Her nine-floor apartment building, including Cheng’s add-on, consisted of 41 segregated units which she rented out at between NT$6,000 and NT$8,000 per month, although she did not rent out the first two floors, it said.
Prosecutors said that she stacked flammable materials in the stairwell between the first and ninth floors, the hallways of the building and on the balconies of several floors.
Prosecutors cited Chuang as saying that the items stored throughout the building were for her recycling business.
Over the past two years, Chuang was cited for 35 public offenses related to safety and was charged with endangering public safety late last year, receiving fines totaling NT$201,600, prosecutors said.
Tenants said that the hallways of the building were so packed with items that only one person was able to pass them at a time.
The Taichung Fire Bureau said that during the fire, the piles of flammable debris hindered rescue efforts and contributed to residents being unable to escape the building.
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