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U.S. NEWS Wednesday 29 august 2018

Chicago fire claims

10th kid as agency

probes neglect claim

By DON BABWIN In an email to The Associ-
Associated Press ated Press, Calderon said
CHICAGO (AP) — The several families were af-
deadliest residential fire in fected by the fire and
years in Chicago claimed that her agency had had
its tenth and final victim on past dealings with three of
Tuesday, as a 14-year-old them, though there were
boy who barely survived no pending DCFS investiga-
the blaze died at a hospi- tions involving those fami-
tal. lies at the time of the fire.
Although authorities ini- Guglielmi said the police
tially believed that two of department is communi-
the people killed by the cating with DCFS about the
pre-dawn Sunday fire at fire and that it's possible the This Sunday, Aug. 26, 2018, photo shows damaged buildings at the scene of a fatal fire that killed
a Southwest Side apart- department could launch several people including multiple children in Chicago.
ment were adults, fire de- a criminal investigation. Associated Press
partment spokesman Larry Langford said the investi-
Langford said they were gation revealed that the 10 they have ruled out elec- works from the porch and what activities might have
all children who ranged in kids attending a sleepover trical wiring problems as a that people smoked ciga- occurred on the porch be-
age from three months to in the home were appar- cause. After learning that rettes there, investigators fore the fire.q
their teens. ently overwhelmed by children had set off fire- were trying to determine
Investigators on Tuesday smoke as they slept and
were still trying to deter- never even awoke to flee
mine the cause of the fire, the fire.
but a police spokesman, "From where the bodies
Anthony Guglielmi, said were, there is a high proba-
they had ruled out arson. bility ... that they were over-
There were no working come by smoke," Langford
smoke alarms or adults at said. "We didn't find any-
the home when the fire body that looked like they
broke out, and the state's were trying to get out the
Department of Children door."
and Family Services said Had there been even a
Tuesday that it was in- single working smoke alarm
vestigating "allegations in the building, the victims
of neglect" involving the could have simply walked
children. A department out the front door to safety,
spokeswoman, Alissandra he said.
Calderon, declined to go While the police have ruled
into further detail about the out arson, Langford said fire
nature of the allegations. investigators were still try-
Only two of the children ing to determine the exact
didn't die at the scene, the cause of the deadliest resi-
teen who died Tuesday dential fire in the city in well
morning, Adrian Hernan- over a decade.
dez, and another 14-year- He said investigators deter-
old who died Monday at a mined that the fire started
hospital. on a back porch and that