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by DAMIEN CAVE
A man died yesterday after he was doused with a flammable liquid and set on fire inside a Brooklyn apartment, the authorities said. Five people were injured in the blaze.
The fire started shortly after 3 a.m. in a seventh-floor apartment at 185 Nevins Street in the Wyckoff Gardens housing complex in Cobble Hill. A man poured a flammable liquid on Ronald Davis, 49, and then set him ablaze, the authorities said. Fire officials said two other men in the apartment tried to extinguish the flames, which spread from Mr. Davis to walls and furniture.
Residents in the building said that about 3:30 a.m., they were awakened by calls for help and the scent of smoke. "I heard banging in the bedroom," said Ana Feliciano, who lives in an apartment on the eighth floor directly above the scene of the fire. "When I went to the kitchen, I saw smoke above the stove. I heard someone yelling to call 911. I heard them saying that they couldn't get out."
Firefighters arrived within minutes and had the fire under control by 3:48 a.m. They carried three men out of the apartment, including Mr. Davis, who died soon afterward. Two other men in the apartment, Steven Wheeler, 52, of Brooklyn, and Gregory Davis, 47, whose address could not be determined, were taken to New York Weill Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan where they were listed in critical condition yesterday afternoon with serious burns. Two other men, a firefighter and a neighbor who lived on the sixth floor, were treated for smoke inhalation at New York Methodist Hospital in Brooklyn. The apartment belonged to Arthur Elliot, 56, who was not in the apartment when firefighters arrived, the authorities said. However, after the fire, he was listed in stable condition at the Cornell Center, but the authorities declined to say if he had been injured in the blaze.
Neighbors said Mr. Elliot lived in the apartment with a teenage girl he said was his daughter. He has lived in the apartment since 1997. The apartment, labeled a crime scene by the police, was boarded up by noon. Charred walls and furniture could be seen from the doorway, but no other apartments on the floor appeared to be damaged.
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