Illegal Drug Activity May Have Led to Apartment Explosion

An apartment explosion that critically burned three people Saturday may have been caused by illegal drug activity, police said.

The explosion rocked the 3600 block of Silver Oaks Way, engulfing a ground-floor apartment in flames. The blaze spread to neighboring units before firefighters arrived to extinguish it.

Police secured a search warrant Sunday and recovered several items of evidence.

"There is evidence that suggests illegal drug activity is a contributing factor, if not the direct cause of the explosion," Lt. Mike Peretti said, adding that a methamphetamine lab has been ruled out as a cause of the explosion.

Police in the past have responded to several drug-related calls in the neighborhood, according to Peretti.

The city of Livermore's building inspector listed the building as uninhabitable, and four additional families living in the complex have been relocated, officials said.

The injured remained in critical condition Sunday, police said.

Authorities identified them as Evan D. Aviles, 21, and his girlfriend, 22-year-old Lexie Miriyah Hutson. Aviles is a resident of the apartment that exploded, officials said.

San Jose resident Paul Lom, 35, also was injured in the explosion.

During Saturday's emergency response, the injured were transported by ambulance to nearby  and  then airlifted by helicopters to hospitals.

Aviles was taken to UC Davis Medical Center. Hutson and Lom were taken to Valley Medical Center in San Jose.

Dawn Fabyan lives in the apartment above the unit that exploded. She said the smell of marijuana in the area was not unusual.

"I wouldn't be surprised if what they were doing (to cause the explosion) was illegal," she said.

Fabyan said she was watching TV with her son when the explosion shook her apartment like a heavy earthquake.

"We weren't sure what happened," she said. "It was scary."

Fabyan and her son evacuated the apartment and saw the three injured people.

"The woman's clothes were torn... she was screaming... and her skin was just peeling off," said Tyler Brundage, Fabyan's son. "It was horrible, just horrible."

Herb Russell lives in a nearby building and was home during the explosion.

"It sounded like a bomb going off," he wrote in the comments section of a previous Livermore Patch report. "Victims ran outside with their skin melting off. It was a terrible scene."

Jean Steiner also lives a building away from the unit that exploded and provided this recap in a previous :

"The blast was so loud that it shook our unit. Then just horrible, horrible screams. I ran down there and one lady's clothes were burned off her. One man was walking around with one hand blown off. The other man was in shock with a huge cut on his head bleeding everywhere. Awful scene."

The explosion and fire caused about $350,000 in damage to three units of the five unit building, Livermore-Pleasanton Fire Battalion Chief Joe Testa said.