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Black Sunday Verdict Reversed
There are alot of angry firefighters out there upset about the recently overturned convictions of the owners of the building where the FDNY Black Sunday tragedy occurred. I wrote a blog yesterday at www.firelawblog.com http://firelaw.typepad.com/fire-law/2010/02/black-sunday-whats-the-... explaining a slightly different perspective on the situation.
My take is the judge's decision is more or less reflective of the way American society treat's fire. The bottom line: our society treats fire as if its an accident - its no one's fault. The result is that the average person does not feel compelled to do anything more than the bare minimum. Got a frayed electrical cord... ah... just use it. Can't find a free electrical outlet - add a power strip. If something happens you won't be held responsible. No need to take any extra precautions.
Funny thing is countries in other parts of the world don't look at fire that way. If you have a fire and you did something stupid - you will be held responsible. And guess what... they don't have anywhere near the problem we have with fire - and their fire codes are not nearly as strict as ours.
Can you imagine the owner of a tractor trailer that killed two people claiming he didn't know the brakes were faulty on his rig, and then trying to blame the driver - instead of making sure the truck is duly inspected? I can't. And I can't imagine a judge letting the owner of the truck off because he claims he "didn't know". If you didn't know - you should have known!
What do you think?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Roy Walker on
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As usual we are expected to perform miracles at a fire,then are considered to be an expendable commodity, in the heat of battle, then move to the back of the bus and shut up!
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Permalink Reply by Ron Ayotte on
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The "judge" in this case is an insipd moron.
The property owner didn't know about the "alterations" and "illegal apartments"?
Bullshit. He knew about it when he collected the rents and pocketed the cash.
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Permalink Reply by Curt Varone on
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I agree 100%. The thing that bothers me the most is that she ruled that way because it was a fire, and because she - like most Americans - believes that non-arson fires are just tragic "accidents". If it was some other type of cause that led to the 2 deaths - drunk driving or something like an illegally modified elevator - and someone played the conscious ignorance card - it wouldn't fly.
http://firelaw.typepad.com/fire-law/
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