The mother of a 20-month-old girl who died in a house fire that was probably ignited by a space heater says the furnace of the government-subsidized rental hadn’t been working for two weeks.
Jade Isabella Mendez was killed in the fire, which started sometime after 3 a.m. Thursday, according to Joelene Yvonne Mix, 30, the girl’s mother.
Mix said the landlord promised to get the furnace running but didn’t.
“He came,” said Mix, speaking about Pastor Thomas Moore, president of Save a Child Inc., which owns the house. “He looked at (the furnace). He didn’t fix it.”
Mix said Jade probably was killed because her old electric-coil space heater caught the small brick home in the 3700 block of Franklin Street on fire.
“(Moore) knew that’s what we were doing,” Mix said, referring to heating the home with a space heater.
Moore declined to comment Thursday. But Claude Pettit, a board member of Save a Child, said Moore has been diligent in keeping the homes up to code.
The rental home is subsidized by the federal Section 8 program through the Denver Housing Authority. Save a Child is a nonprofit group run by Moore, a pastor of Messiah Baptist Church. One of the roles of the nonprofit is to help the homeless.
A neighbor to the fire called the Denver Fire Department at 3:46 a.m., said Phil Champaign, Denver fire spokesman.
Three adults and two children got out of the house, but when they were outside, they could hear Jade crying, said Darlene Mc- Broom, the girl’s aunt.
Joe Mix, the child’s grandfather, ran back into the house toward the girl’s bedroom, but he was forced out by the flames, McBroom said.
“He tried to save her, but he couldn’t get to her,” McBroom said. “He got burnt real bad.”
She said he had third-degree burns and was taken to University Hospital.
He was in serious condition Thursday evening, according to hospital spokeswoman Deborah Mendez-Wilson.
Jade’s brothers, Carlos Mondragon, 7, and Joe Mendez, 10 months, were taken to Children’s Hospital, where they were treated for smoke inhalation, Mix said. The boys were not seriously injured, she said.
When firefighters arrived at the home, flames were rolling out of the windows, Champaign said. Family members were screaming that Jade was still in the house, according to Champaign and John Ray, who lives in a truck behind the house.
Firefighters entered the home and searched for the child, Champaign said. The temperature was probably about 1,200 degrees, he said.
“You have to take extraordinary risks in extraordinary circumstances,” Champaign said. “We go in fully expecting the worst, and, in this case, that’s what happened.”
The fire was contained within 20 minutes and out within 35, he said.
Denver fire Investigator Sandy Sandoval said that the cause of the fire is under investigation but that it started near the space heater. Champaign said there was a stack of newspapers near the heater.
The Denver Housing Authority inspected and approved the house for use in the federal Section 8 program, which provides rental subsidies for poor families.
DHA officials said the house and its heating system passed a 20-page safety inspection in July 2005.
Housing authorities are required by federal law to inspect Section 8 houses at least once a year.
Mix said she called Moore two weeks ago when the furnace stopped working.
He came over and tried to start the furnace, but when he wasn’t able to do so, he said he would send a repairman to do it, said Jade’s father, Paul Mendez.
“The guy never showed up,” Mendez said.
Save a Child has at least seven homes in the Denver area.
Staff writer David Migoya contributed to this report.
Staff writer Kirk Mitchell can be reached at 303-820-1206 or kmitchell@denverpost.com.
