The father of a five-month-old boy who died in an arson fire Tuesday says he is under investigation by the police, but is offering a $25,000 reward for information that helps find the person responsible.
Cordell Brown told reporters at the scene of the fire on Thursday he hopes someone will come forward with information that leads to the arrest of the person responsible for starting the fire that killed his son, Hunter Donovan Chase Brown.
“Murdering a baby is one of the most callous acts that you could possibly do,” Brown said. “He had done nothing in this world except be a happy, cute baby, and it’s just not right.”
Hunter Brown, five months old, died after being rescued from a burning house in Edmonton on Tuesday. (Judith Lam Tang)
Hunter died Tuesday in hospital of smoke inhalation after firefighters pulled him and his mother from a burning house on Armitage Crescent in the Ambleside neighbourhood, in southwest Edmonton.
Six other people, ranging in age from five to 58, were taken to hospital. Homicide detectives are heading up the investigation.
The infant boy’s aunt, Judith Lam Tang, wrote in a personal blog on Wednesday pleading with the public not to speculate about the circumstances of the boy’s death.
“Please don’t spend your time speculating about what happened, and let the police do their job,” she wrote.
Father feels like a suspect
Asked by reporters if he feels like a suspect in the case, the boy’s father said: “I’ve been told not, but I don’t feel that way.
“I’ve been thoroughly investigated and I’m still under investigation. All my vehicles have been impounded and are in the forensics unit, all my clothes have been taken by the police department. I’ve been in with the investigators three times now, for more than 10 hours, with homicide [detectives].
“We went to great lengths to have Hunter,” Brown said. “We’ve been trying for four years to have a baby, so it would not be in my best interest to murder my own son.”
Brown said his mother died last year. He and his wife, Angie Tang, used the inheritance money for fertility treatments.
“He was a fertility baby,” he said of his son. “That was going to be my lifelong remembrance of my mom, and whoever started the fire has taken my whole inheritance away from me. And I really want the justice system to please deal with them appropriately.”
Tang remains in the Misericordia Hospital. Brown said doctors say she has finished hyperbaric chamber treatments but will probably be in hospital several more weeks. The fire caused serious damage to her lungs, he said.
‘Hoping we can make the city safer’
Brown said he put up his own money to fund the $25,000 reward. He asked that anyone with information call Crime Stoppers or Edmonton police.
“The reason that we’re offering the money is because I’m hoping we can make the city safer, that no one else has to go through what we’ve [gone] through.”
Brown offered a detailed account of the chaotic events that night.
He said it was hot in the house and he was sleeping in an office on the main floor, where it was cooler.
At about 4 a.m. he heard a noise outside and said he saw a light shining on the front of the house.
‘I assumed that everyone would have heard me yelling.’ – Cordell Brown
“It looked like someone was shining a spotlight inside the house. And when I went outside to open the door on the porch, the whole porch was engulfed in flames and they were climbing the side of the house and jumping onto the roof.”
Brown said he turned on the garden hose and tried to put out the fire himself.
“When I started spraying, the fire spread so quickly, so I ran back into the house screaming, ‘Fire fire,’ and trying to find my phone. By that time the smoke detectors had all [gone] off in the house … so I assumed that everyone would have heard me yelling. The alarms are incredibly loud. We just installed a really high-tech security system in the house, and they’re really loud.”
Fire was in bedrooms ‘within seconds’
Asked about his wife, he said: “I would have thought she would have already started to get out of the house. I went back outside to spray more, and by then the fire had jumped onto the roof and it was already going into the bedrooms upstairs. Within seconds.
“At first, in my original statement, I thought she yelled back. But I think in the chaos of everything, I think I might have been hearing things. I’m not really sure.”
Smoke was by then billowing out under the front door, and it was “impossible to get in,” he said.
“Our fence was locked, so I jumped the fence and went around back and kept yelling upstairs, because Angie had left the window open a little bit.”
Fire crews arrived soon afterward, and police were quickly called to the home.
Demolition crews began tearing down the fire-damaged home on Thursday. (CBC)