A man whose daughter and grandchild died in a 2015 blaze at an Inglewood condominium complex is suing the landlord and the homeowners association, alleging unsafe conditions led to the fire and trapped the woman inside her unit.
Deontae Green, who lives in Riverside County, filed the lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court against Kenneth Jordan, the owner of the unit the plaintiff’s daughter leased, and the Westward Townhomes Owners Association.
Neither Jordan nor a representative for Westward Townhomes could be immediately reached for comment on the complaint filed Tuesday, which alleges wrongful death and negligence and seeks unspecified damages.
Inglewood police previously said the fire began about 2:30 a.m. on Jan. 29, 2015, in one unit of the three-story complex in the 600 block of Queen Street and then spread to a second unit. Angelina Reed, 22, and her 3-year-old daughter, whose name was also Angelina, lived in one of the units.
The lawsuit states that Reed and her child were trapped in their unit and died of fire-related injuries.
Unsafe conditions at the complex led to the fire starting and contributed to its severity, the suit alleges. The conditions also were to blame for Reed’s delayed notice of, and escape from, the fire, as well as the slow response by firefighters to the blaze, according to the lawsuit.
The complaint does not give specifics about the allegedly dangerous state of the complex, but does maintain that the landlord and the homeowners association had an obligation to inspect the property and make improvements to limit the chances of a fatal fire.
