Legal fight over videos made by inspector who killed himself after collapse
The death of Philadelphia building inspector Ronald Wagenhoffer has become a forgotten chapter in a story already teeming with tragedy: the deadly 2013 collapse that buried a Salvation Army thrift store in Center City.
The death of Philadelphia building inspector Ronald Wagenhoffer has become a forgotten chapter in a story already teeming with tragedy: the deadly 2013 collapse that buried a Salvation Army thrift store in Center City.
Wagenhoffer was the Department of Licenses and Inspections inspector assigned to the demolition of several buildings in the 2100 block of Market Street. On June 12, 2013 - one week after the collapse that killed six and injured 13 - Wagenhoffer killed himself.
Now, the contents of Wagenhoffer's cellphone are the subject of a brewing legal fight between the District Attorney's Office and lawyers for STB Investments Corp., the company of multimillionaire real estate investor Richard Basciano that owned the properties being razed.
Basciano is the lead defendant in litigation consolidated from 20 lawsuits filed on behalf of those killed and injured in the June 5, 2013, catastrophe.
On Monday, Assistant District Attorney Frank Fina, who supervised the two-year county grand jury probe of the collapse, went before Common Pleas Court Judge Mark I. Bernstein seeking a protective order blocking STB's demand for access to Wagenhoffer's cellphone.
Fina argued that Bernstein had no authority to order the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office to turn over the cellphone to STB's lawyers because Pennsylvania's 1980 law creating investigating grand juries limited that authority to the judge supervising the grand jury.
Only Common Pleas Court Judge Lillian Ransom, who supervised the collapse grand jury, may disclose grand jury materials, Fina said, and even that authority is sharply restricted by a 1981 state Supreme Court ruling barring release of grand jury materials for use in civil litigation.
Bernstein did not rule on Fina's request but seemed surprised that he, as a judge, would not be able to order disclosure of grand jury materials after the end of any criminal cases resulting from the probe.
"Even if the grand jury ceases to exist?" Bernstein asked Fina.
Fina said his office may only disclose grand jury material for civil litigation if it was used as evidence in a criminal trial of someone charged as a result of the grand jury probe.
Only two people were criminally charged in the collapse: demolition contractor Griffin Campbell and Sean Benschop, who was operating the excavator taking down the four-story building when an unsupported brick wall toppled and flattened the adjacent one-story thrift shop.
Campbell, 51, of Hunting Park, was convicted of six counts of involuntary manslaughter and related charges and was sentenced in January to 15 to 30 years in prison.
Benschop, 45, of North Philadelphia, pleaded guilty to six counts of involuntary manslaughter and testified for prosecutors at Campbell's trial. He was sentenced to 71/2 to 15 years.
In court filings, lawyers for Basciano and STB have maintained that legal liability for the collapse contractually rests with Campbell, who was hired to raze the Market Street buildings, and architect Plato A. Marinakos Jr., whom STB hired to oversee demolition and who recommended Campbell for the job.
STB lawyer Peter A. Greiner told Bernstein on Monday that Wagenhoffer was in regular contact with Campbell and visited the demolition site the night before the collapse.
Greiner argued that the contents of Wagenhoffer's phone - text messages, photos, and two videos he made before his suicide - could prove valuable to STB's defense.
The manner of Wagenhoffer's death was not disclosed to the jury in Campbell's criminal trial and the cellphone videos were not used as evidence.
Wagenhoffer, 52, is known to have left two videos: one for his wife and son, and the other saying how he was devastated by the deadly collapse.
Last May, before the criminal trial, defense attorney William D. Hobson tried to get access to the cellphone videos. Hobson argued that Wagenhoffer would have been called as a defense witness had he lived and the videos could have information crucial to Campbell's defense.
Common Pleas Court Judge Glenn B. Bronson struck a compromise, inviting Hobson and two prosecutors to join him to privately view both videos if the lawyers promised not to make public their contents. Five minutes later, judge and lawyers returned to court and jointly agreed the videos contained nothing relevant to the defense.
The pressure is building for both sides in the civil case. Bernstein has ordered all pretrial discovery - disclosure of information among the parties - completed by Monday and has set a pretrial conference for July 5.
Bernstein has set Sept. 6 to begin jury selection for a trial estimated to last four weeks.
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