Two operators of the Oakland Ghost Ship warehouse have been arrested in connection with the December 2016 fire that claimed the lives of 36 people at the venue, as CNN and the San Francisco Chronicle report. “Master tenant” David Almena and creative director Max Harris have reportedly each been charged with 36 counts of involuntary manslaughter. Nancy E. O’Malley, the district attorney of Alameda County, brought the charges and said they each face 39 years in prison, The New York Times reports. At a news conference, O’Malley said that Almena and Harris “knowingly created a fire trap with inadequate means of escape.” She continued:

They then filled that area with human beings and are now facing the consequences of their actions. ... The paying guests at the event were faced with a nearly impossible labyrinth of the defendants’ making. They allowed individuals to live in the warehouse and deceived the police, the Fire Department and the owner of the building to that fact. They allowed large groups to assemble in the warehouse for unpermitted and unsafe musical events in that space.

According to CNN, the warehouse had not been inspected in three decades. The San Francisco Examiner reported in December that the Oakland Fire Department had been unable to find any record of a fire inspection ever taking place at the Ghost Ship warehouse. The Mercury News reported this past March that the owners of the warehouse were well aware of the building’s dangerous electrical infrastructure for years.

Among the victims of the Ghost Ship fire were producer/artist Joey Casio, Them Are Us Too’s Cash Askew, and 100% Silk artists Nackt and Cherushii.

Read “After Ghost Ship Fire, Oakland DIY Grapples With a Broken System” over on the Pitch.