By Mark Konkol
The Chicago Sun-Times
CHICAGO — Two young siblings died Tuesday in a raging apartment fire on the Far South Side that their surviving brother said started when he and his sister fixed themselves a late night snack while their pregnant mother slept.
It was past 3 a.m., but they wanted to warm up pizza — a leftover deep dish covered in ground beef, jalapeno and green peppers, 6-year-old Curnet Myles later told investigators.
Their mother, Alicia Myles, eight months pregnant, was fast asleep.
Myles’ daughter Destiny turned on the “eye” — that’s what the 3-year-old girl called the stove burner, according to the story Curnet told investigators. The flame set fire to a pizza box on the range. Then, Destiny tried to put it out with a house slipper. When that did not work, Destiny and Curnet put the burning pizza box in a nearby cabinet, the boy said.
The fire spread quickly at the three-story apartment in the 300 block of East 130th Street, filling the house with a thick, black cloud that set off the smoke detector and woke Myles.
“I woke up and threw up three globs of blood,” Myles told the Chicago Sun-Times Tuesday afternoon, as she waited to be released from Roseland Community Hospital. “There was a fire in the kitchen. I tried to grab the children. I tried to grab my daughter, but she was mad at me. There’s no light fixture in my room and I couldn’t find them. I passed out three times.”
Myles regained consciousness and ran outside wearing only a short T-shirt. Curnet, who family members call “Poo-Poo,” followed wearing only thin pajamas and clutching his “Blues Clues” blanket.
Destiny and a toddler, Jeremiah, 18 months, who had just started to walk, were still inside.
From her bedroom window, Eucita Broughton saw smoke pouring from the adjacent building and Myles, her 25-year-old niece, out in the bitter cold. She called for her son, Leotis Broughton, 22, who rushed outside.
Myles was frantically screaming, “‘My kids are in there,’ ” Leotis Broughton said.
Curnet called out for his sister and started to run toward the burning building. Leotis Broughton stopped the boy and shooed him away. Curnet stood barefoot and weeping in the frozen grass when another cousin carried him safely inside.
Leotis Broughton joined Chicago Police Sgt. Michael Saladino and David Johns, a “repo man” from Manteno, in a brave attempt to search for the kids.
Johns, who saw smoke while repossessing a car nearby, got there first. He kicked in the door and ignored danger. He took a gasp of air and crawled inside. He heard a noise — something less than a cry for help.
“It was the sound of a baby choking. Like the last ... gasp and whimper,” Johns said. “It was surreal, all that smoke and all I could hear was that sound. I was focused on getting to that sound. Pushing forward, forward, forward. But I couldn’t go any farther.”
Saladino, who was on patrol at a neighboring public housing complex, arrived as Johns ran out of the apartment. Together they went back inside.
“We yelled so the kids might hear us,” said Saladino, the father of 2-month-old twins. “I didn’t hear whimpering.”
They had to turn back. The fire got too powerful. The smoke too thick.
Leotis Broughton felt helpless."There was nothing I could do,” he said. “I was sad and mad. Mad I couldn’t save them.”
Firefighters arrived and snuffed the blaze. They found the lifeless bodies of Destiny, on the floor near the bed, and of Jeremiah, still in his crib. Both kids were later pronounced dead at Roseland Hospital, the medical examiner said.
Both Saladino and Johns were treated for smoke inhalation and later released. Broughton was not hurt.
Myles was hospitalized in serious condition and treated for smoke inhalation. Her condition had improved by early afternoon and she was able to call family members and even talk to her only surviving son.
Curnet was with family members Tuesday. When investigators told Curnet his brother and sister died in the fire, the first-grader at Dubois Elementary School asked, “‘When are they going to come back home? Are they going to fix them so they can come back to life?’ ” family members said.
Myles wanted to see Curnet. But the devastated mother was not allowed to take her son with her. The Illinois Department of Child and Family Services launched an investigation of “allegations of neglect against the mother of this family relating to the tragedy,” DCFS spokesman Kendall Marlowe said.
DCFS had found substantiated evidence of neglect against Myles in 2006 and 2008, and is investigating a child abuse report received on Nov. 28, Marlowe said. DCFS also found substantiated evidence of abuse against two of Myles’ boyfriends in 2009 and 2011.
Despite the 6-year-old boy’s story about how his sister started the fire, investigators have not determined the cause yet. Investigators are exploring the possibility that Curnet started the fire while playing with matches.
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