A 22-year-old woman was charged with murder and arson after two Dyker Heights residents died in a fire in their 11th Avenue apartment early Thursday morning, according to the fire and police departments.
Firefighters responded to the fatal blaze at the three-story building between 67th and 68th streets at 7 am, where they found the bodies of the male and female victims, 58-year-old Xi L. Huang and 56-year-old Feng X. Xu, whom emergency medical personnel pronounced dead at the scene.
Emergency responders also rescued four residents who went to the hospital with non-life threatening injuries, the police department said. Emergency personnel transported a 31-year-old male, a 30-year-old female, a 4-year-old girl, and a 3-month-old boy to Maimonides Hospital to be treated for smoke inhalation. The fire department also said in a tweet that three firefighters were being treated for non-life-threatening injuries.
Firefighters had the blaze under control a little more than an hour after they arrived, by 8:16 am, the department said.
The fire department also reported in a tweet that there were no working smoke alarms in the building, which contained four residential units and a storefront unit on the ground floor.
The building’s landlord was brought in for questioning after the blaze, but was not arrested or charged, according to police.
