Deadly Fire Ruled Arson -- Oregon Apartment Blaze Killed Eight

ALOHA, Ore. - A fire that killed eight people in a suburban Portland apartment complex was caused by arson, fire investigators said yesterday.

"This is now a homicide investigation," said Tim Birr, spokesman for Tualatin Valley Fire and Rescue.

The fire early Friday was started in a stairwell that served as the only way out from the 12 apartments in the complex, Birr said.

"It started low and burned upward," he said.

He declined to provide details of how the fire was believed to have started but said investigators do not think the person who set the fire was among those killed in the blaze.

The sudden and unusually hot fire cut a narrow swathe through the north end of the building, killing five children, a teenager and two adults.

A team of federal, state and Washington County arson experts returned to the scene yesterday to search for clues after working until dark Friday night.

Only two fires on record in state history have killed more people - a 1975 hotel fire in Portland that claimed 12 lives and a dance-hall blaze in remote Silver Lake high in central Oregon, where 43 died during a Christmas Eve pageant in 1894.

Witnesses and police who arrived at the scene of yesterday's fire said they did not hear any smoke detectors or fire alarms going off, and Birr could find only one working smoke detector among three he inspected in the building.

There were no sprinklers in the building, and none were required

under Oregon law, which Birr said places responsibility on tenants to ensure that smoke detectors are in working order.

The fire trapped some of the victims in a third-story apartment. Killed were Geremias Aguilar, 37; his wife, Virginia Aguilar, age unavailable; and their children, Jacqueline Aguilar, 8; Karen Aguilar, 10; Agustin Aguilar, 7; and Patricia Aguilar, 5.

In another apartment, a young mother, Francisca Aguilar, 16, collapsed as her husband, Patricio, dropped their 3-month-old daughter, Jennifer, from a third-story window to the waiting arms of a man below. The baby was not injured.

Patricio Aguilar survived and was hospitalized with third-degree burns, but Francisca and her 3-month-old niece, Selena Chavez, died in the fire.