Prosecutors Seek to Prove 36 Counts of Manslaughter for Each Ghost Ship Fire Defendant

It’s been just over a year since Mary Vega last saw her son, Alex. Alex Vega, 22, and his girlfriend, Michela Gregory, 20, were among the 36 people who died on Dec. 2, 2016, when fire engulfed the Ghost Ship warehouse in Oakland.

“It just feels like it happened yesterday,” Mary Vega said Monday outside an Oakland courtroom. “And then at the same time it’s been an eternity.”

This week, Vega is planning to be in court along with other family members of the deceased to hear evidence against two men facing criminal charges for the Ghost Ship fire.

The Alameda County district attorney has charged Derick Almena, the master tenant for the Fruitvale warehouse, and Max Harris, who helped manage the space, with 36 counts of involuntary manslaughter. A preliminary hearing -- where a judge will decide if the evidence merits the case proceeding to trial -- is set to begin Wednesday and take approximately five days.

Prosecutors are expected to interview witnesses and present evidence in support of their charge that Almena and Harris acted with gross negligence and disregard for human life. Prosecutors argue that by allowing people to live in the warehouse, holding events there and conducting unpermitted work in the building, the two men created a high risk of death.

Witnesses are expected to include law enforcement, firefighters, former Ghost Ship residents and survivors of the fire.

Tony Serra, the San Francisco attorney who is representing Derick Almena, said he does not plan to call any defense witnesses, which is typical in a preliminary hearing.

"This is an opportunity for us to have what we call 'discovery' of their major percipient witnesses," Serra said, "to explore their weaknesses, to explore their credibility, to explore their consistency to previous statements given."

Serra said he does plan to lay the groundwork for a defense that seeks to shift blame from Almena and Harris to other responsible parties.

"Countless times, law enforcement, the sheriff, the Oakland Police Department, the Fire Department, Child Protective Services, the inspectors of building -- they visited and they OK'd it by implication and by expression," Serra said. "This was going to be an exception to the rule. So we have to show that in the prelim that there is some responsibility with respect to law enforcement and other agencies."

Serra said he also plans to go after the building owner, Chor Ng. Serra said Ng and her agents had an obligation to keep the building up to code and they should be the ones facing criminal charges.

An investigation completed in June by the Oakland Fire Department, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and the Alameda County Arson Task Force failed to find the direct cause of the fire that killed 36 people. Curtis Briggs, Max Harris's attorney, said that's a weakness in the prosecution's case.

"It’s almost like trying a murder case without finding the body,” Briggs said.

The Alameda County District Attorney's Office declined to comment.

Mary Vega said she wants justice for her son, but she is not sure yet what that will look like.

"I want somebody to say, 'I did it. I’m sorry,' " she said. "It’s not going to happen, but I just want closure."