Starting over with nothing

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This article was published 17/09/2016 (3496 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Sam Lavallee isn’t bitter.

He’s sad, scared and angry, of course, but the 20-year-old says he’s ready to start a new chapter in his life, even if it means starting from scratch.

The high school graduate, who makes a living as a day labourer in the city’s warehouses, has little choice: his family’s home and all their belongings went up in smoke in a pre-dawn blaze Thursday that police suspect was arson.

The seven members of the Lavallee family, Sam, his two brothers, mother, sister, her fiancé and their 13-month-old baby barely escaped the rental they called home for four years.

The house, at 630 Redwood Ave., was one of three homes suspected to have been deliberately torched in the early morning blaze.

Police guarded the locations most of Thursday as arson investigators searched for clues. A fourth home, next to the Lavallee rental and separated by a metre-wide walk, also caught fire and was gutted.

The fires were reported to 911 within minutes after 3 a.m. Thursday.

“It went up so fast, too fast. That’s why we think an accelerator was added in. The (side) porch is where it started … that fire was way out of hand when I opened the (side) door,” Lavallee said.

The North End blaze lit up an entire section of the William Whyte neighbourhood before dawn Thursday.

It’s not known if the other homes were occupied; at least one, next door at 628 Redwood, was empty. Authorities confirmed Thursday there were no injuries.

“I’m glad my family got out and no one was hurt. If I hadn’t smelled something burning? I guess it just kicked into my brain, and I woke up,” Lavallee said, recounting the frantic minutes after the smell of burning wood brought him out of a sound sleep Thursday. 

Lavallee was the only one in his family to grab shoes on the way out, along with his phone and ID. The rest of the family escaped with only the clothes on their backs.

The Red Cross put up Lavallee and his two brothers, aged 21 and 22 at a hotel near the airport for a couple of days, an act of kindness the family credits the Crazy Indian Brotherhood for arranging. The support group for mostly indigenous former gang members connects people in crisis to emergency services.

““We’re only here until Sunday… thanks to the Red Cross. We have nowhere to go. Me and my brothers have to figure out the next steps, raise funds for a damage deposit to rent somewhere and until then, we’re going to have to coach-surf,” he said.

Lavallee said his mother found a place to stay with her fiancé, who also took in Lavallee’s sister’s family. 

“We’re all adults,” he said, adding “This is a new start, that’s the way I look at it.”

“Right now, I’m trying to get as much help as I can. Everything you work for, everything was in that house, and it’s destroyed,” Lavallee said.

He said the instant he saw a bright orange glow through his bedroom window and then the flames, he was out of bed.

The next few minutes were a blur, he said, recounting what he told police at the scene.

“I kicked open the door to my sister’s room and I yelled, ‘There’s a fire! You need to get out! Now!’ I ran up to my brother’s room, and I went to wake up my mom. By the time we got to the kitchen, the flames were already inside. The side of the house and the roof were lit up and completely engulfed. We knew we couldn’t grab anything. We just had to get out.”

Out in the backyard, the family got another shock; the side of their house had flames reaching up to the second storey and spreading across the short walk to the house next door.

Behind them, two other houses were engulfed.

He said as of Friday afternoon the family had yet to get the all-clear from the fire commissioner to re-enter the home to search for anything salvageable or to give statements to investigators.

Winnipeg Free Press readers responded to the family with offers of clothing and furniture and meals. The family also rolled out a crowdsourcing initiative Saturday with a gofundme page.

It can be found gofundme.com/lavalleestartup.

alexandra.paul@freepress.mb.ca

Resident records Redwood house fire

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