CHICAGO, Sept. 8 (UPI) -- Four brothers and sisters died early Monday in a fire that spread from the apartment below theirs in Chicago.
Their mother and her boyfriend escaped the flames by jumping from a window. Both were critically injured, officials said.
Larry Langford, media affairs director for the fire department, said firefighters found the two girls in a closet, a teenager trying to protect her 7-year-old sister from the fire. The boys, aged 10 and 14, were in a bedroom.
Investigators said the fire began in a second-floor apartment and spread to the third floor through an open door. James Freeman, who said he lived in the second-floor unit, told the Chicago Sun-Times he was out when the fire began.
Neither apartment had a working smoke detector. The cause of the blaze was under investigation.
In January, city officials cited the building's owner for a broken furnace, missing smoke and carbon monoxide detectors and other problems. A judge dismissed the case in February.
Darlene Jones, who lives on the second-floor of the three-story building, said she was alerted to the fire by her terrier, Toto. His barking woke her at about 3:30 a.m., and she woke some of her neighbors.
"If it wasn't for Toto, I don't know how many lives would have been lost," Jones said.
