Grandmother is sixth family member to die in house fire

One week after an early-morning house fire claimed the lives of five of her family members, a Decatur grandmother has died.

The Dekalb County Medical Examiner’s Office was notified of Diane Lay’s death Tuesday, an investigator confirmed to The Atlanta Journal-constitution.

County officials said Lay, 61, sustained second- and third-degree burns in the fire that also killed 30-year-old Terryona Regular; her daughters, 6-year-old Aliyah and 3-year-old Angel; and two uncles, 49-year-old Pedro Coney and 55-year-old Timothy Regular.

Lay, the matriarch of the family, owned the house on Janet Lane and brought up several of her relatives there, including grandsons Bonner and Bernard Ziglor. The brothers got a frantic phone call the morning of Dec. 14 and rushed to their childhood home, only to learn it was too late for four of the 10 people living there. A fifth was rushed to a hospital but didn’t make it.

Three others, including their grandmother, were injured. Only two people escaped unharmed.

“It’s tragic. Sad,” Bonner Ziglor said from outside the home last Tuesday. “We’re trying to make it through.”

Investigators were unable to determine what started the fire, and it was not clear whether the home had a working smoke detector. Last week, teams of firefighters went door to door to install detectors in neighboring homes.

Investigators do not believe the fire was criminal in nature, a spokesperson said.

Dekalb Fire Chief Darnell Fullum said it was the 29th fire his crews had worked this month. Since then, crews have responded to five more working fires.

JOHN SPINK/JOHN.SPINK@AJC.COM Dekalb County firefighters monitor for hotspots after a house fire raged in the early morning hours of Dec. 14 on Janet Lane in Dekalb County. Five family members died at the scene and a sixth died this week.