B.C. tenants ordered to pay $500,000 after ‘foreseeable’ fire

Two Vancouver tenants have been ordered to pay more than $500,000 following a November 2017 apartment fire that a judge ruled was “foreseeable.”

B.C. Supreme Court Justice Matthew Kirchner ruled Angela Chou created a risk of harm and fire by keeping her apartment “in a near-hoarding state” with densely packed items covering most of the floor space.

Chou and her former partner Danny Chen, who was not living there but was still listed as a tenant, have been ordered to pay the Langara Gardens apartment building more than $512,000 for damages caused by the fire.

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The fire spread to other apartments, and the court ruled Chou will also pay $56,000 to Langara Gardens for the rent lost while 10 units were repaired.

A fire investigator testified that the blaze started when household goods in the unit, likely a box or a pillowcase, made contact with a halogen bulb when Chou was momentarily out of the room.

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Kirchner’s ruling, released online Friday, says Chou created the “unreasonable risk of harm,” and risk of fire in particular, because of the stacked, combustible material kept in her apartment.