Engineer Arrested 2

[IRstuff]

There is now. We had to wait an extra two months to move into our new building in 2005, because our contractor couldn't get the steel studs needed to put up office walls because the supply was almost all consumed by China's booming economy and infrastructure.

Likewise, there's chronic reports of people stealing copper wire out of occupied and abandoned buildings.

TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[whyun]

Where were the NYC building inspectors when the building was under construction?

Why aren't they blaming the contractor from deviating from the plans?

Is Vargas the engineer of record for the structure or was he an employee of the building owner working as a "building engineer" (a euphemism for the head maintenance guy)?

 

[JStephen]

I was doing some more reading on this, and it is just pretty confused.

Mr. Vargas does appear to be a licensed engineer. But various articles describe him as a building engineer, a structural engineer, and a contractor. It is stated that he put the beams in, etc., but then also that he didn't inspect them, so it's really confused as to what his involvement actually was.

Apparently, for several years, NY City has allowed engineers and architects to certify buildings without the city getting involved.

 

[JStephen]

Oh, one example of the confusion. "There wasn't one ounce of steel in the entire building, needless to say the roof," is a quote from the article above. But then I found another article that said the firefighters were buried under "hundreds of pounds of steel beams".

 

[bridgebuster]

"I'm glad I gave up my New York License..."

"Maybe i will stop looking for jobs in NYC..."


"Where were the NYC building inspectors when the building was under construction?"

There's no witch hunt against engineers going in NY; just take a look at the NYS Education Department's website for disciplinary action.

This indictment could be politics; tragically two men died. Politicians are always looking to for publicity when tragedy strikes. There is so much construction going on in the city, and with it a sharp increase in construction accidents and deaths in NYC in the past year. The Building Department seems to be AWOL.

Last August there was a fire in the Deutsche Bank Building (the old Banker's Trust Building), across from the World Trade Center site, which is being demolished. Two firemen died. The fire is believed to have been caused by smoking in a non-smoking area. The standpipe system was not operational - it was supposed to be; if it were working maybe they'd still be here. Meanwhile, the CM - Bovis Lend Lease - got a pass. They knew what was going on. I'm sure they used some political clout. There were supposed to be safety inspectors on the job at all times - they were being paid to provide this service. Sure, they were fined by OSHA but they'll probably appeal the fine down to nothing.

 

[Sideswiper]

A blogger from Information Week commented on this but doesn't seem to have any more facts that the NY Times article.

http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2008/03/betrayal_of_tru.html

 

[DRC1]

Okay this was a grand jury, so, A. He has been convicted of nothing. B. He did not have an attorney with him. C. The proceedings are not designed to determine the facts, only to determine if there is sufficent evidence to warrant a trial to determine the facts.
Although neither article really says, it sounds like Mr. Vargas was the special inspector, which are hired by the owner in liue of building inspectors. Hopefully there is a logical explination for this.

 

[ZillionM]

Sure there is:

Some one f***ed up real bad >_<
people died..

 

[bridgebuster]

Here's another New York engineer facing criminal charges:

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local...construction_worker_crushed_to_death_at_.html

 

[RARWOOD]

1. Never believe anything you read in the newspapers.

2. Never talk to the police, FBI or any law enforcement agent with out your lawyer being present.

3. If in doubt take the 5th.

With out factual accurate information it is hard to judge the engineer. I am only 55, but I can't even remember which jobs I worked on a year ago. It would not surprise me at all if some one in their mid-eighties had trouble remembering what they did on a job 6 years ago.

Again with out accurately knowing the facts it is hard to express an opinion.

Personally I have a hard time with the federal goverment or other agencies charging people with lying under oath. If they are guilty of a crime then they should be charged with that crime; and the goverment should prove their case.

Unfortunaly you almost never can win when you fight the government. In the past most lumber trade associations also offered grading services. The at some point in the past the Federal goverment sued all the major lumber trade associations for antitrust. All the associations except for the Western Wood Products Association lost their cases and were forced to seperate their grading services from their trade association services.

WWPA, however, did not win their case. The goverment agreed to drop their case, but required WWPA to sign a consent decree agreeing not to engage in any of the illegal activities that the goverment thought they had engaged in.

 

[HgTX]

I shouldn't bring it up here, but I can't resist pointing out the comments on the news article bridgebuster just posted. The dead worker has a Spanish surname (so does the engineer), and immediately people jump in with "stupid illegal immigrant got hisself kilt". Makes me so proud...

Hg

Eng-Tips policies: faq731-376

 

[JStephen]

I noticed buried down in that article,
"The department penalized him after a new special enforcement team found he was allowing his business partner to use Sanchez's professional stamp to submit applications. His partner surrendered his privileges in 2002."

Wow.

I googled Jose Vargas a day or two ago and news reports were that he had pled innocent, not a lot else on the case yet.

 

[bridgebuster]

Some else in NYC is now in trouble

http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2008/03/15/2008-03-15_crane_collapses_in_manhattan.html