Authorities use video surveillance to identify juveniles in school fire

Jen Lawson and Emily Richmond

Friday, July 15, 2005 | 10:48 a.m.

Video surveillance at Roy Martin Middle School provided crucial clues that led fire investigators to accuse a group of juveniles of starting a devastating four-alarm blaze that caused about $7.5 million in damage to the school last week, authorities said.

Investigators determined that the fire was started by either matches or a lighter in the school gym by juveniles who were not supposed to be in the school, Las Vegas Fire & Rescue spokesman Tim Szymanski said.

Investigators determined Sunday that the fire was set intentionally in the gym, but it wasn't until investigators watched tapes from school security cameras that they identified the suspects.

"The kids in question were found on the tapes, and they weren't supposed to be there," Szymanski said.

Representatives from the district attorney's office were there when investigators questioned the juveniles and their parents to ensure the children's rights weren't being violated.

The fire department and Clark County School District Police will be presenting their evidence to the district attorney's office to determine what criminal charges, if any, should be filed against the juveniles.

Szymanski didn't release the names or ages of the juveniles, how many were involved, their motive or whether they were students at the school.

However, he said it doesn't appear that they meant for the fire to do so much damage.

Szymanski called it the biggest fire since the Moulin Rogue was destroyed just over two years ago, and one of the most significant fires in Las Vegas in the past decade.

"These kids didn't get up in the morning and say, 'Let's burn the school,' " he said. "We don't want people to think there are gangs of kids going around setting fires at schools. They were clowning around and probably had lighters or matches and it got out of control."

Still, he added, "they are at the age where they should know playing with fire can get out of hand and they need to be held responsible."

The fire started July 5 at the 46-year-old, wood-framed gym on Stewart Avenue near Eastern Avenue.

At the time of the blaze there were five children and five adults at the city's Hadland Outdoor Public Pool located on school grounds, which is used during the summer months for recreation and aquatics programs.

While the pool is owned by the city, the locker room is school property and the two entities have a reciprocal use agreement, said Paul Gerner, associate superintendent of facilities for the School District.

The city's aquatics program was allowed access to the locker room area only and the adjacent gym was supposed to be locked, Gerner said.

How the juveniles gained access to the gym is a question the district wants answered, Gerner said.

The district will also be taking a closer look at its policy of allowing outside entities to use facilities, Gerner said.

"In light of what we've learned so far from this (the investigation), we will certainly be looking at the sharing arrangements," Gerner said. "But we also have to look at this as a very unfortunate freak occurrence. We've operated schools for a long time without having this kind of thing happen."

Those using the pool and the juvenile suspects were able to escape without injury.

Within minutes the roof of the gym caved in, causing extensive damage to the building.

Nearly 30 fire engines and 75 firefighters from the city, county and North Las Vegas worked for more than two hours to get control of the fire. It didn't spread past the gym, but the rest of the school sustained some smoke and water damage.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives was called in to help with the investigation. Working in teams of three consisting of a representative from the fire department, police department and ATF, the 30 investigators spent the weekend trying to determine how the blaze started.

Just before the fire started, a citizen reported that kids were playing with fireworks near the school, but Szymanski said investigators haven't been able to link that to the fire.

Jace Radke, a spokesman for Las Vegas, said it hasn't been determined if the juvenile suspects were participants in one of the city's recreation programs.

"We're leaving it up to the fire investigators to determine who they were," Radke said.

Operation of the city's summer programs continue as usual, Radke said.

"It would be premature at this point to make any changes," he said.

The district estimates the cost of the damage at $7.5 million. The first priority is making repairs to the nearby classrooms so that the school is ready for the start of the 2005-06 academic year Aug. 29, Gerner said.

The campus was already in line for nearly $7 million in renovations and repairs that had not yet been scheduled. Depending on the outcome of the investigation, the district's insurance policy would likely cover costs over $100,000 to rebuild the gym.