Fire Marshal Claims Coverup Of Deadly Harlem Blaze Cause: Report

HARLEM, NY — An FDNY fire marshal is preparing a lawsuit against the city and his superiors in the department for attempting to squash his investigation into a deadly Harlem blaze that killed a firefighter, according to reports.

Fire Marshal Scott Specht accuses Chief Fire Marshal Thomas Kane, deputy J.D. Lynn and FDNY Assistant Commissioner Carlos Velez of covering up the true cause of a March 23 five-alarm fire that resulted in the death of firefighter Michael Davidson — a 37-year-old father of four from Long Island — the Daily News first reported. Specht reported that the fire officials attempted to cover up the cause of the fire in order to protect Hollywood stars such as Edward Norton and Bruce Willis, who were filming in the building when it burst into flames.

Fire officials announced in April that heat from a boiler ventilation flue pipe sparked the fire after combustible materials left near the pipe erupted in flames. Specht refused to agree with the results of the investigation and insisted that Norton's production company Class 5 Films tampered with the building's electrical system and damaged wiring, the Daily News reported.

"There is no doubt in the professional opinion of (Specht) that Edward Norton’s movie production company was the precipitating cause of the fire that caused the death of Firefighter Davidson," the notice of claim acquired by the Daily News says.

"The underbelly of this tragic situation is the extent that Lynn, Kane and Velez will go in the continuation of the coverup of the death of Davidson."

The FDNY told the New York Post in a statement that a team of nine fire marshals unanimously confirmed the boiler to be the cause of the fire and that, "any additional investigations will come to the same conclusion." A spokesperson for Class Five films also denied Specht's claims that the company was responsible for the fire, telling the Daily News: "this muckraking ignores a tragic reality."

Read the full New York Daily News article here.

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