BURLINGTON, Vt. -
Burlington's fire marshal thinks someone intentionally set a house fire this morning. The home is currently under a complete renovation. Because it's vacant, the city had already deemed it dangerous. No arrests have been made yet in connection to the fire, but the property owner, Chris Khamnei has been in and out of court for a variety of other things.
Multiple 911 calls came in Wednesday morning, reporting a home on Manhattan Drive was up in flames. Firefighters had it under control within ten minutes, but spent the rest of the day snapping photos and digging through the scene. Nine hours later, it was deemed arson.
"One of the things we have to rule out is not just Mr. Khamnei, but somebody being displeased with him," Burlington Fire Marshal Terry Francis said.
Chris Khamnei is the landlord of several properties in Burlington, many of which have had city violations, including the house that burned down.
"He had materials that were stacked up haphazardly and leaned up against the property owners fencing, it's totally unacceptable," Bill Ward, the Director of Code Enforcement said.
I wondered why Khamnei wasn't at the scene and found out he was in court. When I caught up with him there, he didn't want to do an on camera interview, so I went to his house. Khamnei then told me that the string of tickets the city has issued him for being incompliant creates an image.
"God forbid if something big or legitimate actually happens and in this case it did and it makes me look very bad," Khamnei said.
But as of July 2nd, Khamnei was in compliance with city ordinances.
"We made all of these efforts to get the wood out of the backyard which was claimed to be a fire hazard and then we put it in a box truck to comply and that's what catches fire," Khamnei said.
There's no insurance on the home, once it lapsed, Khamnei said it wasn't worth it because there's not a lot of value to the building, but there was some damage done to the house next door, which Khamnei will be responsible for.
Again, police say the fire was intentionally set, but haven't said what was used and they do not have any suspects yet.
