$1 Million Settlement – Failure To Maintain Apartment Smoke Alarms

$1 million settlement – Landlord fails to install, test and maintain smoke alarms in San Francisco rented apartment, resulting in death of father and daughter.

A San Francisco store owner living with his family from Yemen in an apartment above his store died along with his daughter in a nighttime fire. The smoke alarms in the apartment failed to warn family members before thick smoke filled the apartment. The landlord blamed the decedent for disconnecting and failing to maintain the apartment smoke alarms. However, since 2014 landlords cannot make tenants responsible for testing or maintaining smoke alarms. We proved the landlord failed to take responsibility to maintain the smoke alarms, thereby preventing the tenants to wake up in time to safely get out of the apartment.