New York Daily News<\/p>\n
(TNS)<\/p>\n
A suspected arsonist has been arrested for murder for a\u00a0fire that killed three\u00a0<\/a>men \u2014 with two of the victims found in the\u00a0Bronx\u00a0building\u2019s wreckage in the days after the blaze was extinguished, police said Tuesday.<\/p>\n Daniel Santana, 45, turned himself in, accompanied by a lawyer, at the 40th Precinct stationhouse around\u00a09:30 p.m. Monday, cops said. He was charged with arson and three counts of murder.<\/p>\n Santana lives in the Castle Hill section of the\u00a0Bronx\u00a0and has six prior arrests, according to cops.<\/p>\n The\u00a0May 6\u00a0blaze started around\u00a05 a.m.\u00a0and quickly engulfed El South Bronx Deli on\u00a0Third Ave.\u00a0near\u00a0E. 140th St.\u00a0in\u00a0Mott Haven\u00a0and the run-down apartment above, authorities said.<\/p>\n Investigators determined the fire was arson and launched a homicide investigation. Video recovered by authorities shows Santana setting the fire after spreading an accelerant, police sources say.<\/p>\n News of the collar came the same day the\u00a0NYPD\u00a0announced a homicide arrest for\u00a0a fatal fire in\u00a0Inwood\u00a0that claimed the lives of three people,<\/a>\u00a0including a beloved fashion editor and her mother, two days before the Mott Haven fire.<\/p>\n More than 140 firefighters, EMTs and paramedics rushed to the Mott Haven blaze last Wednesday to find heavy flames shooting out of the El South Bronx Deli and the upstairs residence.<\/p>\n \u201cUnits initially made entry but due to heavy fire conditions and the threat of collapse they were driven out of the building,\u201d an\u00a0FDNY\u00a0official at the scene told NY1.<\/p>\n Two firefighters and an emergency medical technician were taken to the hospital with minor injuries from battling the blaze, which took more than four hours to bring under control.<\/p>\n One of the victims was discovered once firefighters extinguished the fire,\u00a0FDNY\u00a0officials said. The two other bodies were found on Thursday and Friday in a section of the apartment where the ceiling had collapsed.<\/p>\n \u201cDue to extensive structural damage, three deceased individuals were found during overhaul (and) demolition,\u201d an\u00a0FDNY\u00a0spokesman said.<\/p>\n One victim was identified as 70-year-old\u00a0Oreste de Leon\u00a0while the other two men remain unidentified.<\/p>\n De Leon\u2019s sister,\u00a0Orpha Rivera, was too distraught to speak when reached by a reporter by phone on Sunday.<\/p>\n The building had been in de Leon\u2019s family for generations, Rivera\u2019s granddaughter\u00a0Salina Rivera\u00a0said.<\/p>\n \u201cThe building is gone. The deli is gone. And our family is left\u00a0grieving the sudden loss of our family member<\/a>. Losing him in such a tragic and violent way has left our family heartbroken and overwhelmed,\u201d Rivera wrote on GoFundMe.<\/p>\n \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 Tuesday evening, the\u00a0Daily News\u00a0spoke with de Leon\u2019s nephew as he exited the family\u2019s home in the\u00a0Bronx.<\/p>\n \u201cWe don\u2019t know who this guy is,\u201c he said of the alleged arsonist. \u201cWe have no idea why (he did this).\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMy uncle was a good man. He didn\u2019t deserve this.\u201d<\/p>\n People were staying in the apartment above the deli despite a vacate order filed by the city\u2019s\u00a0Department of Buildings\u00a0on\u00a0Jan. 13, 2025. Inspectors found the second floor to be in a severe state of disrepair with missing handrails on the staircase. The ceiling, which collapsed in the fire, was sloping on its side, inspectors determined.<\/p>\n Because the vacate order was still in effect, firefighters responding to the\u00a05 a.m.\u00a0blaze thought the apartment was empty but neighbors quickly told them otherwise.<\/p>\n \u201c(There were) people coming and going at all hours of the day and night,\u201d neighbor\u00a0James Ewing\u00a0told the\u00a0Daily News\u00a0Monday. \u201cBut they were nice people. We never had any issues the whole time we were there.\u201d<\/p>\n Ewing said de Leon was a \u201creally sweet older gentleman.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c(He was a) super nice guy. He\u2019d always make sure the block was clean,\u201d Ewing said. \u201cHe would find and recycle bikes and give them to the neighborhood kids.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI think he just allowed people to live there and stay there,\u201d the neighbor said of the apartment, which he described as \u201cin rough shape.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t know the whole logistics of it all, but that was really kind of the case,\u201d he said. \u201cThere were definitely the regulars that were usually in or around the building.\u201d<\/p>\n Santana\u2019s arraignment was pending in Bronx Criminal Court Tuesday.<\/p>\n \u00a92026 New York Daily News. Visit\u00a0nydailynews.com<\/a>. Distributed by\u00a0Tribune Content Agency, LLC.<\/a><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Roni Jacobson, Rocco Parascandola, Thomas Tracy, Kerry Burke New York Daily News (TNS) A suspected arsonist has been…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":233591,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[128,9,24,63,129,131,130],"class_list":["post-233590","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bronx","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","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\/233590","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=233590"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233590\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233591"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233590"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233590"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233590"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}