International Reaction
The ABC7 News I-Team is removing a clearer design of Ghost Ship warehouse owner Derick Almena by his exchange with people to whom he rented, and his issues with law enforcement.
The I-Team researched Almena’s justice records, and has talked on and off a record to people who know him. Some regard him and others had aroused confrontations with him.
Derick Ion Almena hold a Day-of-the-Dead uncover during Cloud 9, an art space in Berkeley 4 years ago. The male who shot a video tells me, Almena was not a performer himself, though a organizer of many events and a producer and photographer. After all those people died in a room Almena rented and ran as an art collective, a spotlight was on him for what he built, and for a conditions inside.
EXCLUSIVE: Ghost Ship founder’s tighten associates speak to I-Team
ABC7’s Lilian Kim was a first to get Almena to address what happened.
“They’re my children, they’re my friends, they’re my family, they’re my loves, they’re my future, what else do we have to say?” pronounced Almena.
Some of his friends are divulgence some-more about Almena and a Ghost Ship warehouse. One former reside supposing video display a lavatory with prohibited H2O powered by a propane tank, proxy wiring issuing by a building, and walls partially dismantled.
“If you’re selecting to live in a space like that, you’re not selecting it formed on safety. You’re selecting it formed on a people, you’re selecting it formed on a community,” pronounced former reside Libby Physh.
PHOTOS: A demeanour inside a Oakland Ghost Ship common warehouse
Physh tells a I-Team, after a fire, she contacted a sheriff’s bureau and drew a map of a building’s blueprint to assistance a liberation effort. People lived in trailers parked inside a initial floor, and in tiny areas via a warehouse, as many as 18-20 people during a time, according to Physh.
“Eighteen people vital all together, there’s going to be not altercations, though arguments,” pronounced Physh.
TIMELINE: Complaints opposite Ghost Ship room given 2014
Court annals endorse some of those confrontations.
– Jan 2015, Almena was arrested during a room on possession of stolen skill — his former landlord’s transport trailer. He was on trial during a time of this weekend’s fire.
– Dec of final year, he was arrested in LA county for sparse theft. Police pulled him over for pushing with an lapsed registration, though found permit plates from a stolen vehicle. The DA forsaken a case.
Mug shot of Derick Almena in Glendale, California taken in December, 2015.
– Jan of this year, after an evidence with a celebration upholder and his friend, a group filed for confining orders opposite Almena, observant they both suffered injuries. But, a group did not seem in justice and a confining orders were denied.
Almena paid $4,500 a month to lease a warehouse, and would afterwards assign tenants $500 to $1,500 for lease — as many as 20 people during a time. Almena balks during suggestions that he was in it for a money, as some of his former tenants and employees tell us.
PHOTOS: Some of a victims of a comfortless Oakland Ghost Ship fire
RELATED: Oakland glow helpline, information for families
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Article source: http://abc7news.com/news/i-team-investigates-background-of-ghost-ship-founder/1642954/
