A jury in Milton has found the owner of an illegal Toronto rooming house negligent in the death of a 24-year-old woman who was trapped in a burning basement six years ago, according to her family’s lawyer.

Jurors in the civil trial awarded the parents of Alisha Lamers about $1.6 million in damages after she died in the basement apartment at 189 Sheridan Avenue, near College and Dufferin Streets, early on Nov. 20, 2013.

In his closing address at the end of a two-week trial, lawyer Michael Smitiuch argued there was extensive evidence proving the house’s owner, Konstantin Lysenko, did not comply with the Ontario Fire Code.

The house had been converted into an unlicensed rooming house. The Ontario Fire Marshal found several violations including no working smoke alarm, a single exit and bars blocking the two basement apartment windows.

The jury’s finding “is a strong message” to landlords that “if you’re going to rent a property for money, you better make sure it’s safe for the tenants,” Smitiuch said in an interview Wednesday. “Because lives are at stake.

Lamers’ parents, Janet Moore and Robert Lamers, launched the lawsuit to bring justice for their daughter, he added.

“It was done in her memory and then secondly it was done to try and prevent what happened to their daughter from happening to anyone else again.”

It may be some time before they see any money, he acknowledged.

Before the trial, Lysenko declared bankruptcy. “The award is one thing, the other is enforcing the judgment and getting payment. We have two other lawsuits pending for fraudulent conveyances of his properties. We’re alleging he sold several properties after the fire in order to avoid any damages awarded,” he said.

“So this isn’t over, this is the first chapter in a long story.”

Lysenko could not immediately be reached for comment.

He was previously fined $75,000 by the City of Toronto after being found guilty by a provincial offences court of multiple fire code violations at the house.

Since 2014, Toronto Fire Services has charged more than 200 people or corporations with operating rooming houses in violation of the fire code, Smitiuch noted in a news release.