Investigators probe arson that killed father, 1-year-old daughter
A father and his young daughter killed in an arson fire that police say is linked to a liquor store homicide have been identified as 37-year-old Esam Musleh and his daughter, Alia Musleh, who would have turned 2 next month, authorities said.
Musleh is being hailed as a hero for trying to rescue Alia from the flames at their home. Firefighters found their bodies together after the early Saturday blaze; their deaths are being investigated as homicides.
The arson fire, police said, is tied to a string of crimes which began after a homicide on April 10 inside Booker’s Grocery Liquor, located at 90th Avenue and Olive Street in East Oakland. Family members told KPIX that Musleh worked as a clerk at the store, but had nothing to do with the fatal shooting of 25-year-old Dejoh Woods.
Another man who frequented the store shot and killed Woods and turned himself in to police on Thursday. Oakland homicide detectives have sent the case to the Alameda
County District Attorney’s Office for review.
The shooting is tied to another shooting of a cashier inside a West Oakland liquor store last Monday evening at 34th and Hollis streets; the clerk was critically injured but expected to survive. On Wednesday evening, someone intentionally set fire to Booker’s Grocery Liquor.
The blaze on Saturday erupted while the family was asleep at about 12:14 a.m. at the home on the 9500 block of Stearns Avenue, across the street from Bishop O’Dowd High School, not far from the Oakland Zoo. Other family members managed to escape but were injured.
“The father and the child were found together,” Oakland
Police Chief LeRonne Armstrong said. “And so it’s really sad, but the father is a hero. He sacrificed his life.”
Musleh’s cousin, Mohammed Alsamma, told KPIX family members heard explosions before the fire. Alsamma also lived at the home but was at work when the fire broke out. He said Musleh’s wife suffered second degree burns. The family came to the Bay Area to escape war-torn Yemen, he said.
“We thought we are safe here,” Alsamma told KPIX. “But death followed up to this place.”
The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has been called in to investigate, working with the Oakland police and fire departments, Alameda County Arson Task Force and the county District Attorney’s
Office.
A reward of up to $40,000 is being offered for information leading to the arrest of people responsible for the deaths of the father and daughter and the people injured in Saturday morning’s fire.
As of Monday, Oakland police had investigated 46 homicides, up from 16 last year at this time.