Pastor helping collect for victims of house collapse
HAMILTON » The 16-year-old daughter of Tika Justice is undergoing rehab to treat injuries she sustained during last week’s deadly collapse that killed her mother and injured her 20-year-old sister.
Officials gathered at a news conference Monday inside the Saint Phillips Baptist Church in the township to give a brief update on the girl’s condition and outline plans to raise money for Justice’s funeral service, which is behind held at the township church.
Pastor Joseph Woods, who has led the congregation for the last eight years, hopes to raise $10,000 for funeral expenses through a GoFundMe account and other collection efforts.
Woods said the Justice’s township home was reduced to a “pile of rubbish.”
“They have lost everything,” he said.
Details for the memorial service, tentatively set for Saturday, are still being worked out, Woods said.
He added Justice’s daughters are “holding up strong” following the collapse of the 1804 South Broad Street rental home where they lived with their 38-year-old mother.
Officials rescued Justice’s daughters from the rubble, finding the mother on top of her 16-year-old as if she was attempting to shield her from falling debris when the home collapsed on itself due to what an engineering firm concluded was long-term water damage of an exterior wall.
Members of the Justice family, including 20-yearold daughter Azirea Miller, were present at the news conference but didn’t speak and were led up a stairwell and out of conference room at the end of the presser.
Woods and Mayor Kelly Yaede delivered remarks but didn’t field questions from reporters about the collapse.
Yaede hoped the collection and fundraising efforts would help make the daughters’ “lives a little easier” as they bury their mother.
The landlord who owned the rental home, William “Bill” Pozniak, was in the process of evicting the family from the home for not paying rent.
Pozniak went to court numerous times over the years trying to evict Justice, a single mother who lost her husband some years ago, over her inability to pay the $1,455 monthly rent or pay it on time, records obtained by The Trentonian showed. Justice worked as a receptionist at a Bordentown accountant’s practice until leaving that job earlier this year to search for another full-time gig. She has been remembered as a dedicated mother who helped her oldest daughter pay her way through the first year of college, Woods said. “She pushed her girls hard and wanted the best for them,” he said. The township responded to calls for donations, the pastor said, by bringing in about 120 bags of clothing and household items, along with furniture and thousands of dollars to help the family find a new home and recover from the tragedy.
Woods didn’t know the Justice family prior to the tragic collapse, but he has since claimed them as members of his congregation.
“When one member of our community hurts, it impacts us all,” he said.