Nassau Contractor Indicted For NYC Wall Collapse That Killed Girl

BROOKLYN, NY — The owner of a Nassau County construction company was indicted today on manslaughter charges after a wall he built in Brooklyn collapsed in 2019 and killed a 5-year-old girl, officials said.

Nadeem Anwar, 46, of Valley Stream, and his company, City Wide Construction and Renovations, Inc., were both arraigned in Brooklyn Supreme Court and charged with second-degree manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, second-degree reckless endangerment, first-degree offering a false instrument for filing and second-degree falsifying business records.

Anwar was released without bail, and is due back in court on May 11.

“The wall that this defendant allegedly built was a disaster waiting to happen," said Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez. "He allegedly failed to obtain the proper permits and failed to reinforce and secure the structure as required by law. As a direct consequence of his alleged recklessness, the wall collapsed and caused the senseless death of a precious 5-year-old child. My heart is with the victim’s family, and we will now seek to hold this defendant accountable.”

According to Gonzalez, 5-year-old Alysson Pinto-Chaumana was with her mother and some friends visiting a friend at 444 Harmon St., a three-story building in Bushwick, around 8:20 p.m. on Aug. 29, 2019. The group was waiting outside the building near a tall wall that fenced-in a patio. The wall had a base of heavy stone pillars topped with horizontal stone plates.

Gonzalez said that one of the pillars and plates fell inward and hit the girl, crushing her and killing her.

According to Gonzalez, and investigation into the collapse found that Anwar was hired to renovated the facade of the building in September 2018, and committed numerous violations of the New York City Building Code. Though Anwar is a licensed contractor in Nassau County, Gonzalez said he was not authorized to work in New York City, and he had another contractor file the application for work on the facade, but not for building the wall.

Gonzalez said that Anwar did not have the permit to build the wall at the building, nor did he have a licensed engineer or architect do a post-construction analysis of the wall's stability, which is required by law.

An engineer that examined the wall after the collapse found it was mostly held together by its own weight and gravity, instead of being properly anchored and using engineer-grade adhesive. According to Gonzalez, the engineer said the wall had multiple building code violations and was "imminently perilous to life."

"Performing construction work without the necessary permits can have devastating consequences," said Constadino Sirakis, acting commissioner of the city Department of Buildings. "This indictment sends a strong message to the construction industry that this City will not tolerate bad actors who cut corners and jeopardize the safety of our fellow New Yorkers."