Judge grants new trial to man convicted of starting fire that killed 3 Pittsburgh firefighters

Nineteen years later, their names come up in training sessions, on Valentine's Day and in regular conversations around the No. 8 firehouse in East Liberty.

Firefighters see the names of fallen comrades Patricia Conroy, Marc Kolenda and Capt. Thomas Brooks on memorials there and at Engine 17 in Homewood. They don't want to hear them read in court again.

“These families have suffered enough,” Deputy Chief Dan Hennessy said on Wednesday as word spread through Engine 8 that the man convicted in the firefighters' 1995 deaths would get another trial. “They have to go through this again. Our question is: Is that justified?”

Allegheny County Common Pleas Judge Joseph K. Williams granted Gregory Brown, 36, a new trial based on evidence that jurors were not told that a federal agent and a prosecutor promised to reward two key witnesses with thousands of dollars in exchange for testimony.

The District Attorney's Office appealed the judge's decision but declined to comment.

Sam Rabadi, special agent at the Philadelphia Field Division, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said “ATF stands by our personnel, our arson investigative techniques, and the use of rewards in criminal investigations.”

U.S. Attorney David J. Hickton said in a statement the judge's decision “is unjust” and his office supports the appeal by the district attorney's office.

“There's hope here. There's hope for justice,” said David Fawcett, one of Brown's three attorneys who clutched Brown's hand when Williams read his decision. “What happened here was an atrocious abuse of government power. What we had happen here was something that every parent, every citizen of Allegheny County, every citizen in the country ought to be concerned with, which is the government using its power and misusing it as they did in this case.”

Brown is serving three consecutive life prison terms for his conviction on three counts of second-degree murder for torching his East Hills home to help his mother collect insurance money. A bail hearing is scheduled for Monday. His family declined to comment.

Brooks, 42, Conroy, 43, and Kolenda, 27, went to the burning home shortly before midnight on Feb. 14, 1995, and became separated from other crews when an interior stairwell collapsed. Their families declined to comment on Wednesday.

“Retracking that night, when I reported to that incident and crawled into that window and seen the three bodies of my fallen firefighters laying there on that floor, it's brought back different memories,” said Joseph King, president of the International Association of Fire Fighters Local 1. “So if I feel this way, you can imagine what the immediate family feels like.”

Williams said he judged the credibility of witnesses who testified at a hearing in May 2012, not facts of the case.

“This case is not about the guilt or innocence, because that issue is not before me,” the judge said.

Instead, Brown's attorneys claimed their client's 1997 trial was “constitutionally flawed” because prosecutors never disclosed their promise to reward two key witnesses for their testimony.

“We're very thankful that Judge Williams took the time to look at this case closely, to hold a hearing as he did, and to look at the facts,” Fawcett said. “What happened on Bricelyn Street many years ago was a great tragedy. There's no reason in the world though why that tragedy had to be followed with another tragedy.”

Evidence presented at Brown's trial revealed that his mother, Darlene Buckner, took out a $20,000 renter's insurance policy three months before the fire.

On the day of the blaze, Buckner claimed she and her son went to a nearby Giant Eagle store at 11:45 p.m. and returned about 1 a.m.

Neighbor Keith Wright testified that he saw Brown in front of the burning home, placing him at the scene. Another witness, Ibrahim Abdullah, then 15, claimed that Brown bragged about setting the fire, telling him that some “fire heads” were killed in the blaze. Wright and Abdullah could not be reached.

A jury convicted Brown of second-degree murder, arson and insurance fraud. The jury cleared his mother of homicide and arson but convicted her of insurance fraud.

The ATF paid Wright $10,000 and gave Abdullah $5,000 in August 1998, according to court documents.

Wright came forward in October 1995 to say that he saw Brown in front of the home after the ATF and the District Attorney's Office offered a reward for information. Williams wrote in his 32-page opinion that although Wright's revelation “poked a serious hole in (Brown's) alibi, (it) would not have taken such a serious blow to its believability if the jury knew Keith Wright had a possible motive for coming forward — that motivation being the monetary reward.”

Firefighters at Engine 17 said their memories are painful. Brooks was captain there. Conroy and Kolenda worked from Engine 8 but were assigned to Engine 17 that night.

Battalion Chief Tim Kopicko recalls being called to the scene to collect the fallen firefighters' gear.

“On Valentine's Day, every year, all day we think about it,” he said.

He and Hennessy expect firefighters to attend the trial.

“We haven't forgotten, and we won't,” Hennessy said.

Adam Brandolph is a Trib Total Media staff writer. Reach him at 412-391-0927 or abrandolph@tribweb.com. Staff writer David Conti contributed.