{"id":230903,"date":"2026-05-14T02:06:45","date_gmt":"2026-05-14T02:06:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/230903\/"},"modified":"2026-05-14T02:06:45","modified_gmt":"2026-05-14T02:06:45","slug":"man-arrested-for-bronx-fire-that-killed-3-held-without-bail-for-murder-arson-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/230903\/","title":{"rendered":"Man arrested for Bronx fire that killed 3 held without bail for murder, arson"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">A suspected arsonist accused of murder for <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nydailynews.com\/2026\/05\/07\/man-dead-after-fire-tears-through-queens-house\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"elm:link;elmt:article_link;slk:setting a fire that killed three men;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;setting a fire that killed three men&quot;}\" class=\"link \">setting a fire that killed three men<\/a> in a Bronx building was ordered held without bail at his arraignment Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Daniel Santana, 43, wore a camouflage print hoodie as he pleaded not guilty before a Bronx Criminal Court judge. He was charged with three counts of murder, plus arson, and faces life in prison if convicted.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">An attorney with Bronx Defenders assigned to Santana declined to comment outside court.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Messages left for Bronx Defenders seeking comment were not immediately returned.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The suspected arsonist <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nydailynews.com\/2026\/05\/12\/arson-suspect-fire-killed-three-men-oreste-de-leon-el-south-bronx-deli\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"elm:link;elmt:article_link;slk:turned himself in;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" data-yga=\"{&quot;yLinkElement&quot;:&quot;context_link&quot;,&quot;yModuleName&quot;:&quot;content-canvas&quot;,&quot;yLinkText&quot;:&quot;turned himself in&quot;}\" class=\"link \">turned himself in<\/a> at the 40th Precinct stationhouse around 9:30 p.m. Monday, cops said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Santana lives in the Castle Hill section of the Bronx and has six prior arrests, according to cops.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The May 6 blaze started around 5 a.m. and quickly engulfed El South Bronx Deli on Third Ave. near E. 140th St. in Mott Haven and the run-down apartment above it, authorities said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Video recovered by authorities shows Santana setting the fire after spreading an accelerant, police sources say.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Two firefighters and an emergency medical technician were taken to the hospital with minor injuries suffered from battling the blaze, which took more than four hours to bring under control.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">One of the victims was discovered once firefighters extinguished the fire, FDNY officials said. The two other bodies were found on Thursday and Friday in a section of the apartment where the ceiling had collapsed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">One victim was identified as 70-year-old Oreste de Leon. The other two men currently remain unidentified.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Tuesday evening, the Daily News spoke with de Leon\u2019s nephew as he exited the family\u2019s home in the Bronx.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cWe don\u2019t know who this guy is,\u201d he said of the alleged arsonist. \u201cWe have no idea why (he did this).\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cMy uncle was a good man. He didn\u2019t deserve this.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">The building had been in de Leon\u2019s family for generations, according to a relative of the victim.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cThe building is gone. The deli is gone. And our family is left grieving the sudden loss of our family member. Losing him in such a tragic and violent way has left our family heartbroken and overwhelmed,\u201d de Leon\u2019s sister Orpha Rivera wrote on GoFundMe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">\u201cThis was not just a property \u2014 it was my grandmother\u2019s childhood home, her late mother\u2019s home, and a place filled with decades of memories, and history. It also housed the deli she rented out, which used to be my great grandmother\u2019s and was recently renovated.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A suspected arsonist accused of murder for setting a fire that killed three men in a Bronx building&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":230904,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,6060,90638,90639,9,24,63,90640,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-230903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-bronx-criminal-court","tag-bronx-defenders","tag-daniel-santana","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-setting-a-fire","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230903","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=230903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}