Authorities are investigating a suspicious death after a man
died in a house fire in north Morgan Hill Tuesday morning.
Authorities are investigating a suspicious death after a man died in a house fire in north Morgan Hill Tuesday morning.
The fire at 80 Preservation Way started about 4:30 a.m., according to Morgan Hill Police Sgt. Jerry Neumayer. The house was already fully engulfed in flames when the first engine from Santa Clara County Fire Department arrived before 5 a.m.
The fire was mostly extinguished, but still smoldering about 10:30 a.m. Firefighters, police and the American Red Cross were still at the hectic scene at the end of a residential court. Neighbors and emergency vehicles crowded the narrow street, which was closed to regular traffic.
A male was found dead inside the home when firefighters were able to enter, County Fire battalion Chief Rich Salazar said. The body was still inside the home, and authorities were waiting for the coroner to arrive late in the morning.
Salazar could not confirm if the body was that of an adult or child, and authorities declined to release his name.
Neighbors who gathered around the cul-de-sac said an adult married couple lived at the home. The couple’s next-door neighbor, Ray Wylie, said the deceased man’s name was Bill Mizner, and was in his early 50s. Wylie described Mizner as a “good guy, all around.”
Neighbors also said Mizner’s wife was not home at the time of the fire.
Wylie said the couple had lived there at least 10 years. Due to the “incredible amount” of items stored on the property that were destroyed in the flames, it was apparent the couple had lived there for several years, Salazar said. An old motor home, railroad car, piles of wood and containers of paint and other chemicals were stored in a shed and outside behind the home.
Several neighbors said they heard a loud explosion – one of the noises that first alerted them to the emergency before fire engines arrived. Salazar said it is “not uncommon” for small explosions to happen in house fires. The county’s hazardous materials unit was present to mitigate the potential spread of toxic chemicals.
A Chevrolet Malibu and a Chevrolet pickup truck in the driveway of the destroyed home appeared to be damaged, but not totally burned.
Two teenage brothers who live across the street were among the first witnesses on the scene, and they said the explosion they heard about 4:30 a.m. shook their house.
“We thought it was an earthquake,” said Rafael Anaya, 17.
Josh Anaya, 18, said his mother woke him up when she heard noises across the street. He ran outside and the garage or shed behind the home was already in flames, and the house was just beginning to burn. He heard glass breaking, and burning ashes were shooting into the sky.
Thinking the couple were still inside the burning home, Anaya ran to the back of the house and tried to go inside to help the residents evacuate. When he tried to open a screen door, smoke started billowing toward his face, preventing him from entering. He went back across the street and tried to use a bucket of water to diminish the flames, and he said another neighbor tried to use a garden hose to extinguish the fire before firefighters arrived.
Arson investigators were dispatched to the scene to determine the cause of the fire, Salazar said. Also dispatched were engines, trucks, a breathing unit, and battalion chiefs from Santa Clara County, South County, CalFire, Gilroy and San Jose fire agencies.
The Anayas said they thought the fire was started intentionally because the garage or shed behind the house was engulfed in flames first, while the section of the home that was on fire was not adjacent to the burning outbuilding.
“It was two separate fires – nothing else was on fire,” Josh Anaya said.
