Fifth member of Jamaican family dies after Bronx fire

A Jamaican national has become the 13th victim of the deadly fire in the Bronx, New York City, that killed four other members of his family last week.

Taken off life support

Family member Andrene Paul told reporters that Holt Francis, 27, who had been critically injured in the blaze died on Thursday after he was declared brain dead and taken off life support at Jacobi Medical Center.

Four other family members killed

Francis had been in a coma since the fire in the Belmont section of the Bronx ripped through his apartment building on Prospect Avenue on December 28 killing 12 people, including his wife, Karen Stewart-Francis, their daughters, 7-year old Kelesha and 2-year-old Kylie. His niece, Shawntay Young also died in the fire.

Doctors removed Francis from life support a few days after his condition deteriorated.

“He has already passed. I don’t know how long he lived after being taken off,” Kaidan Blake, Francis’s niece told reporters, adding “we were hoping for a different outcome…we were hoping he would show some progress.”

The Jamaicans, who were killed in what has been described as the deadliest fire in New York City in more than 25 years, were part of an extended family that occupied five units in the building.

Relatives in the other apartments including a pregnant woman survived the fire that the authorities said was started by a three-year-old boy who was playing with the burners on a stove.

Go-Fund Me Account

Francis’ relatives have started a GoFundme account to pay for funeral and burial expenses, and the cost of bringing their bodies to Jamaica.