The contractor who was charged in connection with a fire that left his girlfriend’s three children and her parents dead has gone missing.
A judge has scheduled an emergency meeting to try and figure out Michael Borcina’s whereabouts.
He was working on the $1.7million mansion in Stamford, Connecticut, owned by his girlfriend Madonna Badger when it burst into flames on December 25, 2011
The blaze killed seven-year-old twins Grace and Sarah Badger, nine-year-old Lily Badger, and their maternal grandparents, Lomar and Pauline Johnson.
Borcina is supposed to have handed over three documents in the last year as part of the lawsuit into the fire.
City attorneys want to examine Borcina’s records and interview him about his work on the home — but no one, including his own lawyer, knows where he is, the Stamford Advocate reported
Authorities said the fire began after Borcina left a cardboard box of fireplace ashes, which were still smoldering, in the property’s mudroom.
The building was torn down a day after the blaze ripped through it.
Borcina, who was renovating the Victorian home, was accused in the lawsuit of contributing with other defendants to make the house a ‘firetrap.
It included allegations he failed to install a smoke detection system during the construction.
Ms Badger and Borcina parted ways in the aftermath of the tragedy.
Borcina had taken responsibility for the deadly blaze, but in May he changed his story and insisted it was Ms Badger who started it.
He told attorneys during a lawsuit deposition that he lied to police about how the deadly blaze was sparked because he wanted to protect his then-lover.
Borcina has already settled a separate lawsuit with the victims’ father for $5million.
Richard Emery, a New York lawyer representing Matthew Badger, said the settlement is the first in the lawsuit, which remains pending against several other defendants.
‘It is nowhere near reflective of the ultimate value of this case: three little girls’ lives,’ Emery said. ‘No money could compensate for that.’
Matthew Badger filed the lawsuit in July 2012 against Borcina, his company Tiberias Construction of New York City, the city of Stamford and others.
Claims against the city and other defendants remain unresolved.
