On one fateful night, people of Menifee truly came together

The charred remains of apartment units, carports and vehicles show the devastation of Tuesday's fire. (Staff photos)

By Doug Spoon, Editor

Amid divisive feelings among so many Americans these days, stories of unity are a welcome sign of hope. One of these stories was written Tuesday night in Menifee, where local residents came together with police and firefighters to save lives.

Thanks to the quick action of these people -- many of them strangers to one another -- five residents of an apartment complex were rescued from a raging fire that started about 10 p.m in the Menifee 55+ retirement community of Sun City. In all, five units were red-tagged, six residents were displaced, and all their belongings were lost.

The cause of the fire remains under investigation, which may last two weeks, a fire official said Thursday. Remarkably, only one person was hospitalized, and that resident was already suffering from disabilities.

It could have been a lot worse. In the words of those who experienced it, here’s what happened that night:

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Rhonda King and her husband Charles were out for a late-night ride in their golf cart. The Kings live in a different 55+ community on the east side of the 215 Freeway, but they often cruise around the Sun City core community on the west side. It was a bit late this night and they were heading home eastbound on Cherry Hills Boulevard as they drove past the Sun City Civic Association complex on the corner of Sun City Boulevard.

“I told my husband I saw smoke,” Rhonda recalled, looking toward a row of one-bedroom apartments on the southeast corner of the intersection. “We went down the alley behind the apartments and we noticed a car on fire. It was a white car in a carport and it was all in flames. Then I heard glass breaking. By that time, there was black smoke.”

Rhonda and Charles ran around to the front of the complex, realizing they were the only ones around. The streets were quiet. They had to do something.

Just then, Dene Snyder was walking north on Sun City Boulevard on her way to the store. She had taken a short cut from the nearby home where she lives with her grandparents and was walking through the SCCA parking lot when she too saw smoke.

“I just decided to talk a walk,” she said. “That’s not like me. Something told me to walk over to Stater Bros. instead of waiting until the morning. It was so quiet; I kept looking behind me to see if anyone was there.”

When she got to the corner, Snyder saw the smoke and realized something was wrong. She also saw the Kings, who were getting out of their golf cart. All three began knocking on doors, trying to get the attention of the seniors inside – most of them already fast asleep.

The first door Rhonda and Charles knocked on was the unit they believed was the source of the fire, because flames were rising from the carport behind it.

“It took a while to get her to answer,” Rhonda said about Denise MacDonald, who lived alone in the one-bedroom apartment. “My husband was yelling, ‘You need to get out; there’s a fire.' She was kind of hesitant. I think she was scared.

“She said, ‘I have two cats.’ My husband went in and tried to find them. He got one out but the other one scratched him and he couldn’t get it. He told the woman, ‘We have to get out now.’’’

While this was happening, Rhonda and Dene Snyder were helping residents safely out of the other units in the row of six apartments. By this time, a crowd was gathering and others began to help. Neighbors interviewed today said they know those rescued only by their first names: James, Margo, Denise, and Fred.

But there was no response at one of the middle units, where Robert Haro lived with his mother Esther Cruz. Esther is blind in one eye, recently suffered a small stroke, and was confined to her bed on oxygen.

Photo by Zagia Perez

“The lady next door said there’s a lady in there who’s disabled,” Snyder recalled. “Right then, a guy pulled up in a car and jumped out. By that time, a police officer arrived.”

Menifee Police Sgt. Daniel Higgins was the first police or fire department responder on the scene. Although Fire Station 7 is only a few hundred yards away on Bradley Road, 911 calls from the residents on scene were routed first to local law enforcement dispatch, which is standard procedure.

“On a 911 call, law enforcement is the primary PSAP (Public Safety Answering Point),” said Tawny Cabral, public information officer for the Riverside County Fire Department. “Once law enforcement is dispatched, the call is routed to fire dispatch as well.”

Once Fire Station 7 was dispatched, its engine and medical patrol vehicle were on scene in four minutes, Cabral said. By that time, Higgins and three others were involved in a crucial rescue.

“When I got there, people were congregated out in front,” Higgins recalled. “Somebody had smashed a window on one of the units, trying to get in. They said a disabled woman was inside. I crawled through the window to find her.”

The man who jumped out of his car to help had been driving from his aunt’s house in Sun City en route to his home in Moreno Valley when he saw the smoke. The 32-year-old man, who asked to be identified only by his first name Cody, ran to the middle unit and crawled through the broken window, right behind Sgt. Higgins.

Flames had not yet reached that unit, but the fire was spreading quickly through the carports and a common attic. Smoke was filling up the unit around Sgt. Higgins when he realized Cody was behind him. Esther's son Robert, her caretaker, was not home at the time.

“When I found the lady, I turned and this guy was there behind me,” Sgt. Higgins said. “I said, ‘Woah, OK. Go unlock the door so we can carry her out.

“I didn’t realize the extent of her condition at first. I said, ‘Hey ma’am, we’re going to get you out of here.' She just laid there with her eyes wide open. I don’t think she knew there was a fire."

By that time, motorcycle officer Matt Bloch arrived and entered the apartment, along with a man named Timmy, a friend of Robert's who lives nearby.

“When we found her, she was just laying there, hooked up to oxygen,” Cody said. “I looked through the window in a back door to the garage and all I saw was fire, like 6 feet away. The four of us picked her up, put her on a blanket and carried her out through the door.

“As soon as we got her to the sidewalk, her room started to go. If we didn’t go in, she’d be gone.”

Robert Haro was shopping at Stater Bros. in the adjacent Cherry Hills Plaza when he ran into a friend who told him his house was on fire. He ran home in time to see his mother being placed in an ambulance. She was hospitalized for a day because of her previous health condition, but she suffered no injuries resulting from the fire, Haro said.

"It's probably a good thing mom was on oxygen, because she probably would've inhaled a lot more smoke," Haro said. "On the flip side, an oxygen tank and fire ... they had to get that out of there fast."

Haro said he and his mother were given enough cash and supplies for a few days by the Red Cross, but they need help. Esther is in hospice care and has been provided a hospital bed at the residence where she and Haro are staying temporarily. Beyond that, Haro has no idea what they will do. Like the others, he was a renter and lost everything. He had no type of insurance.

"Mom has dementia and Alzheimer's," Haro said. "I asked her last night if she remembered the fire and she said yes. Today she doesn't remember. After her TIA (small stroke), she stopped talking for a few days. She's talking again. They wanted to put her in a home and I said no, I will take care of her with hospice."

Haro expressed gratitude for those who were on scene to help so quickly.

"A lot of people were there to help," he said. "Think what might've happened. We're talking minutes before the whole thing went up."

Cody stayed a few minutes, helping roll out some hoses with the firefighters who had arrived. He then headed home to Moreno Valley was his mother, but he didn’t get much sleep that night.

“It was the right thing to do,” Cody said, trying to avoid the media spotlight. “I just happened to be in the right place at the right time. I hope they are all OK.”

“It all happened so fast,” Snyder recalled on Thursday. “I’m still a wreck. It’s such a quiet little area, but when this happened, everybody just appeared. In a few minutes, there were dozens of people out in front.

“I knew if we didn’t get that lady out right then, we were gonna have to stand back and watch the place burn down with her still inside.”

Neighbors gathered outside the apartment complex the next morning, assessing the damage. Everything inside was charred black. Crews were in the alley, repairing damaged power lines and a transformer. Representatives of the nearby Sun City Gardens retirement community were there to offer assistance.

Denise MacDonald, whose carport showed the first sign of flames, is staying with her son nearby. The fire victims have received some assistance from the Red Cross, and some of them are staying with relatives, neighbors said.

“I was sleeping when I heard pounding on the door,” MacDonald recalled. “I looked in the direction of the garage, where I think the fire started. I was able to get one of my cats; I don’t know what happened to the other one. When they got me out, I started yelling at people that there’s a disabled woman next door.”

MacDonald’s daughter-in-law, Tammie Basham, said Denise lost everything.

“All she had on was her nightgown,” Basham said.

Sgt. Higgins is in his fourth month with the new Menifee Police Department. He previously served as a police officer for 13 years in Oakland – a much different environment than he said he has experienced so far in Menifee.

“It’s a whole different world up there,” Higgins said. “In all my years there, I never had anybody wave or say hi. It happens every day here. When I see people wave and say thank you, I realize this is a city that actually welcomes us.”

Offers of assistance from the community are pouring in – all in a town where, like everywhere else, politics and a pandemic have people on edge. Perhaps for at least a short time, despair has turned to hope.

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A couple from another part of town, just out for a golf cart ride in the cool of the evening. A woman from a nearby neighborhood walking to the store. A man driving past on his way home. None of them residents of that apartment complex. None had ever met before.

Yet they stopped and worked together with neighbors, police and fire personnel in what is fast becoming known as a heroic deed.

"We're getting paid to do this; it's our job," Higgins said about first responders. "These people just jumped in and did what had to be done."

Said Basham: “It makes me proud to live here."

If you would like to make a donation to the fire victims, message the Menifee 24/7 Facebook page or email info@menifee247.com with your contact information. We are coordinating these efforts and will have more information soon.