Collapse survivor: 'A giant ripping sound . . . and the whole store was gone'
Richard Stasiorowski was excited on the morning of June 5, 2013. He was in his sixth month as assistant manager of the Salvation Army thrift store in Center City and the store was getting a new cashier, Kimberly Finnegan.
Richard Stasiorowski was excited on the morning of June 5, 2013.
He was in his sixth month as assistant manager of the Salvation Army thrift store in Center City and the store was getting a new cashier, Kimberly Finnegan.
"Kim and I were friends," a friendship that developed over prior experiences at the Salvation Army Adult Rehabilitation Center in Roxborough, Stasiorowski told a Philadelphia jury Friday.
Stasiorowski said he arrived about 9:45 a.m. at the store at 22nd and Market Streets and spotted Finnegan with store manager Margarita Agosto at the cash register.
"I remember giving Kim a hug, putting my apron on," Stasiorowski said. "I remember coming from the front of the store. The next thing was a giant ripping sound. And when everything was stopped, the whole store was gone."
So was 35-year-old Finnegan, recently engaged, one of the six people who died under the rubble when a freestanding three- to four-story wall remaining from an adjacent demolition site toppled and crushed the Salvation Army store.
Thirteen people were injured and one of them died 23 days later.
Stasiorowski, 35, of Pennsburg, Montgomery County, was among the injured. He testified as one of those suing the Salvation Army and the owners of the adjacent Hoagie City building.
Stasiorowski returns to the witness stand Monday for questioning by Salvation Army lawyers when the civil trial begins its fifth week before a Philadelphia Common Pleas Court jury.
Stasiorowski, who told the jury he was a beneficiary of the charity's Adult Rehabilitation Program, described working for the nonprofit and less-than-optimal conditions in the thrift store: rodents in the basement, "rain inside" when there was a downpour, dirt and dust everywhere.
He also described a rigid chain of command in which he could only report problems or complaints to Agosto, who would forward them up the chain of command. And Stasiorowski said he did so in the week before the collapse when he and other employees regularly heard the noise of bricks and other debris landing from the demolition site.
Questioned by plaintiffs' lawyer Steven G. Wigrizer, Stasiorowski said he often saw bricks and other debris on the Ludlow Street sidewalk and roadway behind the thrift store.
Stasiorowski, however, said officials of the Salvation Army in Philadelphia or at headquarters in West Nyack, N.Y., never told him or others in the store about warnings of the danger of an "imminent collapse" made to the charity by representatives of the owner of the Hoagie City property: New York real estate speculator Richard Basciano and his STB Investments Corp.
Had Salvation Army officials passed down those warnings, Stasiorowski said, he would have been more aggressive in passing on what he and his coworkers were seeing.
Like other store workers who have testified, Stasiorowski said they all joked about something coming through the roof.
"There were thuds that were louder but . . . I never thought something like that would happen," Stasiorowski added.
Why wouldn't you think that? asked Wigrizer.
"I assumed that the people in charge of the store had our best interests at heart," Stasiorowski replied.
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