Parents of children killed in fire arrested

Cathy Scott

Friday, Jan. 30, 1998 | 11:54 a.m.

The parents of three children left alone about an hour before a house fire killed two of them have been arrested and charged with felonies, Metro Police said.

Armondo Gonzales, 30, and Elvira Guardado-Gonzales, 28, were arrested at 10 a.m. Friday and each charged with three counts of felony child neglect, police said.

The parents had left the children, aged 2, 4 and 6, at home Saturday night to go grocery shopping, according to Tim Szymanski, spokesman for the Las Vegas Fire Department. The couple told investigators they left home about 10 p.m.

At 11:09 p.m., firefighters received a 911 call for a fire in a small two-bedroom, wood-framed home at 1606 Ferrell Street near Rancho and Vegas drives. Shortly after firefighters arrived, they rescued the 6-year-old boy and a 2-year-old girl from a bedroom, Szymanski said. Both were unconscious. Paramedics tried unsuccessfully to resuscitate the girl on the scene, he said.

The boy was still in critical condition at UMC's pediatric trauma center

Their 4-year-old brother's burned body was pulled out of the fire from a back bedroom, where he was found dead on his bed.

The fire was started from a space heater plugged into an extension cord in the second bedroom, Szymanski said.

"The children's parents were not at home at hte time of the blaze and the children were unsupervised," homicide Lt. Wayne Petersen said. "The case involving the circumstances surrounding the fire and subsequent injury and deaths was submitted to the Clark County District Attorney's office by the homicide section."

Petersen said the parents voluntarily turned themselves into detectives.

The deaths mark the first of the year in the city by a fire. Last year, eight people lost their lives due to fires in the city.