'I am no monster': Woman whose arson killed 3 firefighters begs forgiveness at sentencing

Xerxes Wilson , Meredith Newman | The News Journal

Show Caption Hide Caption Wilmington Fire Department lacked training years before fatal fire Federal investigators warned Wilmington about a lack of training after a fire injured 15 firefighters in 1997. They reiterated the same advice after three firefighters died in Canby Park in 2016. 1/16/18

The Wilmington woman who started the 2016 Canby Park house fire that killed three firefighters will serve 30 years in prison.

Beatriz Fana-Ruiz, 31, was sentenced in New Castle County Superior Court Friday after pleading guilty last summer to charges including second-degree murder and first-degree arson.

In court Friday, she begged the victims' family for forgiveness through tears.

"I take full responsibility for my actions," she said.

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The consequences included the deaths of three firefighters, injuries to others, reverberating debates over firefighter funding and ongoing litigation against the city.

The courtroom was filled with tearful family members of victims and firefighters, some dressed in uniform and others wearing sweatshirts representing their local union.

"It was our own, very personal 9/11," said Rev. Brad Martin, Wilmington Fire Department's chaplain, at Friday's sentencing.

The fire began in the basement of a rowhome at about 3 a.m. on a Saturday morning in September 2016.

Arriving firefighters received incorrect information that people were still inside so three — Christopher Leach, Ardythe Hope and Brad Speakman — rushed into the first floor of the burning home.

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Shortly after, the first floor collapsed, sending the three plummeting into the burning basement.

More firefighters, including Jerry Fickes, rushed to their rescue. Fickes was carrying Leach out when another portion of the floor collapsed, trapping them. They died on the scene.

Hope died months later. Speakman was hospitalized for 40 days. He declined comment after the sentencing hearing.

A forensic investigation revealed that something flammable had been spread in the basement near wooden dollhouses. During interviews with federal agents, Fana-Ruiz confessed to having used body spray and a lit piece of paper to set the dollhouses on fire, prosecutors have said.

She told police she was high on Xanax and alcohol and started the fire out of anger toward her stepmother and the general trajectory of her life, prosecutors have said.

"Fana-Ruiz did not want to injure or kill firefighters that night ... " said Deputy Attorney General John Downs at Friday's hearing. "But those reckless actions caused tragic consequences."

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She faced between 17 years to life in prison. Both prosecutors and defense attorneys asked the judge for 25 years.

Superior Court Judge Eric Davis sentenced Fana-Ruiz to five additional years on top of those requests because she knowingly endangered people by setting the fire — even if other factors also contributed to the firefighters' deaths.

"Arson was intended in this case," Davis said before handing down his sentence. "When you start a fire, there are natural consequences that flow from that."

In an unusual moment, Davis asked the court to observe a moment of silence for the victims before he handed down his sentence.

Kevin O'Connell, the public defender who represented Fana-Ruiz, asked the court and the public to understand his client is a human being and more than the person who caused the fire.

She is a mother to a 15-year-old son and an immigrant who was raised in "difficult circumstances," deprived of maternal figures and the victim of abuse, he said.

THE AFTERMATH: Canby Park fatal fire timeline

Untreated mental issues were compounded by self treatment that became substance abuse, he said. Some people are born with the gifts to rise above abuse and dysfunction in their surroundings, and some are not, O'Connell said.

"I am no monster," Fana-Ruiz said through tears.

O'Connell told the court the "self pain, self loathing and remorse" she feels "created a greater prison than the walls of Baylor (Women's Correctional Institution) could provide."

"There is not a day that goes by that I don't think about what happened," she told the court.

Fana-Ruiz will be about 60 years old when she is released from prison. After that, she faces likely deportation back to the Dominican Republic, the place she emigrated legally from in the '90s.

Her family is here. At least some have ostracized her.

A letter written by Fana-Ruiz's stepmother was read by Downs in the hearing. In it, she says the fire left them homeless and blamed by "strangers" for starting the fire, and racked with survivors' guilt.

"It should have been us," the woman wrote.

O'Connell said when Fana-Ruiz is released and deported she'll "be starting from scratch."

The sentencing ends the pursuit of criminal punishment, but families of those killed are continuing a federal civil lawsuit that claims cost-cutting policies at the fire department by city officials contributed to the disaster.

Thomas Crumplar, an attorney pursuing that litigation, said the city hasn't "shared the same remorse" as Fana-Ruiz.

He referenced an ongoing conflict between city administrators and the union representing firefighters, claiming the city refuses to solve "the problem of inadequate staff."

"The city is in fact doubling down and not has not recognized the mistakes that they made," he said.

The city has denied responsibility. A federal judge recently rejected motions to dismiss the lawsuit. A settlement or judgement against the city could see the financial cost of the episode rise.

Last year, city officials said Wilmington has paid or anticipates paying more than $11 million to the affected firefighters and their families in medical and other costs.

Contact Xerxes Wilson at (302) 324-2787 or xwilson@delawareon line.com . Follow @Ber_Xerxes on Twitter.

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