Manhattan District Attorney Alvin L. Bragg Jr. today announced the guilty plea of JELANI PARKER, 41, for intentionally starting a fire inside a Hamilton Heights apartment building that destroyed the property and injured three firefighters. PARKER pleaded guilty in New York State Supreme Court to one count of Arson in the Second Degree. Under the terms of the plea, he is expected to be sentenced to 12 years in state prison, followed by 5 years of post-release supervision on January 13, 2026.
“Jelani Park intentionally started a 6-alarm-blaze that injured three of the heroic firefighters who responded to the scene and left 35 families without homes,” said District Attorney Bragg. “Fire poses a major hazard to our densely populated city and this act of arson not only threatened Parker’s neighbors, but those in the surrounding area.”
According to court documents, statements made on the record in court, and as admitted in the defendant’s guilty plea, at approximately 2:50 p.m. on November 17, 2017, PARKER, a tenant in the apartment building located at 565 West 144th Street in Hamilton Heights, entered the building with a red gas can, took the elevator to the top floor, and went into the sixth-story apartment that he shared with his mother and father.
Once inside, PARKER doused a room with gas and lit it on fire. Video surveillance later obtained from the building shows PARKER leaving the smoke-filled apartment at approximately 3:10 p.m., hurriedly walking down several flights of stairs, and exiting the building shortly before the fire spread to other floors. The blaze culminated in a 6-alarm fire that required more than 200 members of the FDNY to extinguish. Three responding firefighters suffered injuries.
In total, more than 35 families were displaced from their homes as a result of the fire.
After the incident, PARKER fled to North Carolina and then to California, where he was apprehended before being brought back to New York.
Assistant D.A.s Rachana Pathak (Chief of the Worker Protection Unit) and James Clarke (Worker Protection Unit) are handling the prosecution of the case under the supervision of Assistant D.A.s Christopher Beard (Deputy Chief of the Rackets Bureau), Christopher Conroy (Chief of the Rackets Bureau) and Judy Salwen (Deputy Chief of the Investigation Division) and Executive Assistant D.A. Jodie Kane (Chief of the Investigation Division). Paralegals Lilah Hixson, Ava Thomas, and Paulina Morales provided assistance.
District Attorney Bragg thanked the following organizations and individuals for their assistance with the investigation: the FDNY, and in particular, Fire Marshals Richard Faraci, Mark Colicci, as well as Chief Fire Marshal Daniel Flynn, Captain Stephen Elliot (retired), Lt. Michael Mullarkey, Capt. Michael Senise; ATF/NYPD/FDNY Strategic Explosives & Arson Response (SEAR) Task Force, and in particular, Agent Kin Chung Lee; NYPD and Arson & Explosion Squad, and in particular, Retired Detective Edward Simonetti; Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department; and Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office.
Defendant Information:
JELANI PARKER
New York, NY
Convicted:
- Arson in the Second Degree, a class B felony, 1 count
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