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OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) – A key witness scheduled to testify this week in the involuntary manslaughter trial involving a Northern California warehouse fire that killed 36 people has died in a car crash.
Alameda County prosecutors told a judge Monday that Robert Jacobitz was killed over the weekend. Prosecutors say Jacobitz was hired as an unlicensed contractor to do inexpensive wiring at the Oakland warehouse three years before a fire erupted in the illegally converted building in December 2016.
Investigators looked closely at the warehouse’s electrical system before concluding the cause of the fire could not be determined.
Testimony in the involuntary manslaughter trial of Derick Almena and Max Harris started Monday in Oakland. Each faces 36 counts of involuntary manslaughter.
Prosecutors say they turned the warehouse into an unsafe entertainment venue and residence.
