Police looking into last week's deadly hotel fire raided the hotel in Bucheon, west of Seoul, and the home of its owner Tuesday, officials said. Investigators from the Gyeonggi Nambu Provincial Police also raided the home of the hotel's manager and the office of a company in charge of the hotel's fire inspection. Police also booked the hotel manager who was involved in the initial response to the fire on charges of professional negligence leading to death or injuries. Police had earlier booked the hotel's owner and its nominal head. The fire at the nine-story hotel claimed the lives of seven people and injured a dozen. Officials said the fire led to a large number of casualties as the hotel was not equipped with sprinkler systems and smoke spread quickly through narrow corridors. Many died of smoke inhalation, but two victims fell to their deaths after jumping onto a safety air mattress that firefighters installed on the ground. Video footage showed the mattress overturning after one of the two landed on a corner of it. Police have questioned 24 people as witnesses so far, including the survivors of the fire and hotel employees. They plan to investigate how the fire started, and what made it spread so fast as soon as they analyze the confiscated evidence from the raid. Meanwhile, the company that provides fire inspection services to the hotel reportedly found no issues in the latest fire inspection conducted in April, raising suspicions that the checkup was poorly done. Source: Yonhap News Agency
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