{"id":190996,"date":"2026-04-09T15:46:31","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T15:46:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/190996\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T15:46:31","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T15:46:31","slug":"accused-queens-arsonist-has-no-known-ties-to-4-victims-including-toddler-he-killed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/190996\/","title":{"rendered":"Accused Queens arsonist has no known ties to 4 victims, including toddler, he killed"},"content":{"rendered":"

The accused arsonist arrested for killing four people, including a 3-year-old girl, has no known connection to the illegally subdivided Queens apartment building or its residents where he set the blaze after swiping a beer nearby, police sources said Thursday.<\/p>\n

Roman Amatitla allegedly set the fire by lighting a piece of wood he found inside the entrance of the building on Avery Ave. near College Point Blvd. in Flushing on March 16, the sources say.<\/p>\n

\"ThreeFour people were killed, including a child, after a four-alarm fire broke out inside the building on College Point Blvd. in Queens on March 16. (Theodore Parisienne \/ New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Before the blaze, the city Department of Buildings slapped a partial vacate order on the address because the owner had subdivided the second and third floors<\/a> into multiple dwellings, officials said. More than a dozen squatters were living in the building at the time of the fire, authorities believe.<\/p>\n

The fire quickly tore through the building, killing four people<\/a>, including 3-year-old Sihan Yang and 50-year-old Chengri Cui. The names of the other two victims, a 61-year-old woman and a 63-year-old man, have still not been released.<\/p>\n

\"ThreeFour people were killed, including a child, after a four-alarm fire broke out on College Point Blvd. in Queens on March 16. (Theodore Parisienne \/ New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Neighbors saw flames shooting out windows as terrified residents leapt from the building.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomething blew up,\u201d Wadud Mohammad told the Daily News shortly after the fire. Mohammad, 59, works at a local gas station. \u201cThe whole roof was on fire. People were jumping from the building. Others were running across the street.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of the men died at a local hospital, while the other three victims died at the scene. Five firefighters, including two who fell through a staircase, were hospitalized with minor injuries.<\/p>\n

\"ThreeFour people were killed, including a child, after a four-alarm fire broke out on College Point Blvd. in Queens on March 16. (Theodore Parisienne \/ New York Daily News)<\/p>\n

Seven surviving residents \u2014 three women and four men, ranging in age from 33 to 67 \u2014 were treated for burns, smoke inhalation and other minor injuries.<\/p>\n

Amatitla, 38, was captured by U.S. marshals on Tuesday at his Maspeth home and charged with murder, assault, arson and petty larceny.<\/p>\n

Neighbors said that the building had long been poorly maintained.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat building is chaos,\u201d said the 30-year-old worker, who would only identify himself as Eric. \u201cThe door is always open, like anyone can just walk in. No one was taking care of that house.\u201d<\/p>\n

Department of Buildings records indicate an inspection of the Avery Ave. address in 2020 revealed the owner improperly converted the two-family building into a seven-family building \u201cby creating five additional single-room occupancies and nine additional bedrooms.\u201d<\/p>\n

Inspectors found the rooms \u201cwith key-locking devices, bed, TV, cooking equipment, refrigerators and food items in rooms,\u201d before the partial vacate order was put in place, city records show.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The accused arsonist arrested for killing four people, including a 3-year-old girl, has no known connection to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":190094,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[262,263,266,85,267,9,24,264,12,63,261,122,124,123,265],"class_list":{"0":"post-190996","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-queens","8":"tag-city","9":"tag-county","10":"tag-crime-and-public-safety","11":"tag-latest-headlines","12":"tag-local-news","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-city","15":"tag-new-york-county","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-nyc","18":"tag-nyc-crime","19":"tag-queens","20":"tag-queens-headlines","21":"tag-queens-news","22":"tag-sub-county-region"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=190996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/190996\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/190094"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=190996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=190996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=190996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}