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Subcontractor, Supervisors Charged in Deutsche Blaze

NEW YORK CITY—The city and the general contractor will implement new safety procedures under agreements with the Manhattan D.A.; neither will be prosecuted.

By Paul Bubny | Updated on December 22, 2008

NEW YORK CITY—Three construction supervisors and the subcontractor on the former Deutsche Bank building dismantling have been indicted in connection with the fatal August 2007 blaze at the contaminated office tower. Neither the city nor the general contractor, Bovis Lend Lease, have been charged, but both must institute remedial safety measures under agreements reached with the Manhattan district attorney, Robert Morgenthau.

At a news conference Monday afternoon, Morgenthau announced his office will prosecute John Galt Corp., the subcontractor; Jeffrey Melofchik, the Bovis site safety manager for the project; and two John Galt employees, foreman Salvatore DePaola and Mitchel Alvo, director of abatement. All have been charged with second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide and reckless endangerment in connection with the August 18, 2007 blaze in the partially dismantled tower at 130 Liberty St., in which two New York City firefighters were killed and more than 100 were injured. The tower was irrevocably damaged on 9/11, when part of the south tower of the World Trade Center collapsed on it.

Although Morgenthau is not bringing charges against the city or any of its agencies, he puts part of the blame on the Bloomberg administration. “Everyone failed at the Deutsche Bank building,” Morgenthau says in a statement. “The contractors violated their contractual provisions and city rules and regulations in the way they conducted the abatement and deconstruction of the building. Worse, they dismantled a large section of the standpipe in the basement with catastrophic results. In turn, the city and its agencies, especially the Fire Department and the Department of Buildings, failed to discover the gaping hole in the building’s fire protection system. A single inspection of the basement would have uncovered the disabled standpipe, yet that inspection never took place.”

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