WHY WERE THEY THERE?
Radiator that killed kids had blown before: tenant Family placed with one of city’s ‘worst’ landlords
THE FAULTY radiator that fatally burned little Ibanez and Scylee Ambrose (right, with their parents) spewed scalding hot water and steam in a similar incident last year, a former tenant told the Daily News on Thursday.
THE FAULTY radiator that killed two baby sisters had broken down a year earlier — and the nonprofit hired by the city to maintain the Bronx apartment did nothing about it, the previous tenant said Thursday.
Charlene Jackson, 33, told the Daily News her two sons were lucky to be alive after a valve popped off their bedroom heating unit in August 2015 — spewing scalding water and steam.
Less than a year and a half later, Ibanez Ambrose, 2, and Scylee Ambrose, 1, died Wednesday afternoon after the same radiator popped a valve, gushing steam that scorched them with burns over 70% of their bodies and causing organ failure.
“Now we have two dead babies,” Jackson told The News. “It could have been avoided if only they fixed that little piece.”
The girls’ cause of death was “hyperthermia and thermal injuries due to exposure to hot steam,” according to the medical examiner’s office.
The Hunts Point Ave. building — owned by a notorious slumlord — is used by the city to house homeless families as part of its cluster-site program, which provides temporary shelter in privately owned complexes.
Jackson said she reported the malfunction to her caseworker at the Bushwick Economic Development Corp., the nonprofit hired by the city to oversee the apartments.
“She said she’d send somebody to fix it,” recalled Jackson, a nurse’s aide whose sons were 12 and 13 at the time. “But of course, nothing ever happened. Nobody ever came.”
Using a towel to protect her hand from the heat, Jackson eventually managed to turn off the radiator. Her family was moved out of the apartment a month later.
“I just put the little piece back on,” Jackson said. “I told my kids to stay away from it.”
A source confirmed that the Department of Homeless Services received no report of a faulty radiator. Calls to the nonprofit went unreturned Thursday.
The startling revelation emerged as officials and the Ambrose girls’ relatives expressed outrage over the city’s decision to place the family in a building owned by Moshe Piller.
The Brooklyn-based property owner was listed as No. 4 on Public Advocate Letitia James’ watchlist of “100 Worst Landlords” when the family was moved into the building in late 2015.
Piller, who’s been on and off the list for years, was the subject of 1,263 violations issued by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, as well as 168 Buildings Department complaints, James said.
“Government failed these two children,” James said Thursday.
A total of seven homeless families were living in Piller’s buildings at 710 and 720 Hunts Point Ave.
“Why on Earth would the city locate a cluster site in a building owned by a slumlord?” said Councilman Ritchie Torres (DBronx).
The girls’ grieving great-aunt Lois Doane raised a similar question.
“How could they throw them in a building owned by this kind of landlord?” said Doane, 41. “This is something that could have and should have been prevented.”
The Bronx district attorney’s office launched a probe as Mayor de Blasio described the girls’ deaths as a “freak accident.”
“There’s going to be a very full investigation, a rigorous investigation to figure out what happened here,” de Blasio said. “But what we know so far suggests an extraordinary and unprecedented accident, something that no one that I’ve talked to so far in any agency has ever seen anything like this.”
“This was a freak accident,” the mayor added. “A series of painful coincidences that led to the loss of these children.”
James sharply criticized the mayor’s characterization of the
tragedy.
“This was not a freak accident by any means,” she said.
A rep for Piller’s firm declined to answer questions Thursday.
“Our hearts go out to the family, but right now we’re not in a position to comment since the matter is under investigation,” said Toby Bergman.
De Blasio campaigned for mayor vowing to get rid of cluster sites — but has relied on them even more heavily than his predecessor, Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Cluster-site families are placed in apartments by nonprofits hired by the administration, though the city is responsible for inspecting them twice a year.
Social Services Commissioner Steven Banks said officials inspected the Ambroses’ apartment Monday.
“They didn’t find anything untoward,” Banks said.
The victims’ mother, Danielle McGuire Ambrose, 24, told police the girls were both napping in their bedroom with the door closed when she left the apartment at about 10:12 a.m. Wednesday, sources said.
Her husband, Peter Ambrose, 35, was asleep in the living room.
Danielle returned home at 11:46 a.m., sources said. She opened the door to the room to find a scene of horror — searing steam everywhere and her lifeless girls still in bed.
The panicked mother screamed for her husband, who rushed into the room, scooped up the girls and raced outside yelling for someone to call 911, sources and witnesses said.
Investigators do not believe the couple is culpable in the deaths, sources said.
Meanwhile, the Ambroses have been the subject of a total of six child welfare cases in New York and Maine, sources said.
Peter Ambrose has two prior arrests in the city. He was busted for possession of a hypodermic needle in July 2015 and has a history of drug abuse, sources said. Ambrose was also arrested for fare-beating in 2012, the sources said.
MTA bus driver Tatia Ross was among dozens of people who stopped by a makeshift memorial that was set up outside the building.
“Two babies right before Christmas,” said Ross, 50. “I’ve never even seen these kids, but I’m still choked up.”