The demolition crew that killed a 51-year-old homeless woman while knocking down a house earlier this month was performing the work on behalf of the city of Atlanta, according to documents obtained by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
North Grading & Clearing, a company based in Carrollton, had been hired by the city’s Office of Code Compliance to demolish 12 homes for $91,775, according to documents obtained through an Open Records Act request.
One of those jobs — a single-family home on Daniel Street, near Oakland Cemetery — resulted in the death May 7 of Janice Durham, who had sought shelter in the abandoned structure, authorities said.
In the three weeks since her death, the city has not publicly acknowledged that the contractor was working for the city.
The documents obtained by the AJC show that the city ordered North Grading & Clearing, owned by Arthur and Nick North, to halt all its demolition work on May 17 — 10 days after Durham’s death — and suspended its contract with the company the next day.
“The purpose of the suspension is to allow time for the city to conduct further investigation into the circumstances surrounding the incident at 52 Daniel St. on May 7, 2011,” Assistant City Attorney Jeffrey S. Haymore said in a letter to the company.
It is not clear why it took 10 days for the city to order the company to stop demolishing homes. The mayor’s spokeswoman said Friday she did not know the answer to that question.
“Obviously anytime there is a loss of life, it’s distressing,” said the spokeswoman, Sonji Jacobs Dade. “No one wants to see anyone harmed.”
The seven-day suspension was scheduled to end Wednesday, when the city planned to inform the company about “the status of that investigation and North’s contract with the city.”
When reached by phone, Arthur North said, “We’ve been instructed by the city right now not to comment on anything.”
The primary issue emerging in Durham’s death is whether the demolition crew searched the house to make sure it was empty before tearing it down — and whether the city directed the company to do so.
An Atlanta fire department spokesman said Friday that the crew told firefighters at the scene that the company had searched the home immediately before demolishing it. But three residents of the neighborhood told the AJC on Friday that they did not see the crew enter the house.
“They just started tearing it down. They didn’t walk inside the house whatsoever,” said Sharon Huff, 56, who lives around the corner but said she and others watched the crew demolish the house.
An Atlanta police spokesman told the AJC earlier this week that police did not expect to file charges in the matter. Within days, however, both city and police spokespeople backed off that position. Jacobs said Friday the city was awaiting the results of a criminal investigation into the matter that might be presented to a grand jury.
The AJC had requested documents and interviews with city officials to confirm whether the code compliance office had directed North Grading & Clearing to make sure the house was empty.
The city produced some of the documents the AJC sought, but as of Friday evening it had not granted any interviews. The documents showed no evidence that the code compliance office ordered the company to search the home.
Had the work gone as planned, it would have cost the city $7,497 to tear down the home on Daniel Street. Now, if the city is held liable for Durham’s death, it could cost taxpayers much more.
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