In the early morning hours of January 22, 2013, a rapidly spreading fire tore through the Palos Verdes Inn, a two-story residential hotel located at 1001 South Palos Verdes Street in the coastal community of San Pedro. Firefighters returning from an unrelated medical call nearby noticed smoke billowing from the 90-year-old single-room occupancy building around 3:30 a.m. before any emergency calls had even been logged. Inside, panic ensued as heavy smoke and advancing flames quickly blocked escape routes, forcing several trapped residents to lean out of upper windows or leap from the second floor to survive.
Sixty-nine-year-old Richard Dennis Gunderson, a White male resident of the building, was among those trapped in the blaze. Approximately 150 firefighters from the Los Angeles Fire Department converged on the scene, utilizing ladder trucks to pull residents from windows and battling aggressive flames inside. Crews managed to bring the fire under control in approximately 34 minutes, but the inferno left fourteen people injured, three of them critically. Gunderson suffered severe injuries during the disaster and was rushed to a local hospital, where he succumbed to his injuries and was pronounced dead that same day.
Investigators from the Los Angeles Fire Department Arson Section and detectives from the Los Angeles Police Department quickly determined that the blaze was suspicious and criminal in nature. The unusual speed with which the flames engulfed parts of the building indicated that the fire had been intentionally ignited. Building residents reported that alarms failed to sound properly during the emergency and told reporters that the property had long struggled with persistent criminal activity, illicit narcotics transactions, and recurring gang violence, raising concerns that the hotel had been deliberately targeted.
Because the fatal fire was deemed incendiary, the investigation was taken up by the Los Angeles Police Department's Robbery-Homicide Division. Detectives examined the physical remains of the damaged rooms and interviewed surviving tenants and neighbors in search of anyone seen fleeing the hotel just before smoke erupted. Despite widespread publicity surrounding the catastrophic fire and the extensive damage to the residential community, investigators were unable to identify the individual responsible for lighting the fire.
More than a decade after the fatal blaze, no arrests have been made and no suspects have ever been publicly identified in connection with the arson. Richard Dennis Gunderson lost his life in what authorities consider an intentional and criminal act of violence, yet his case remains completely unsolved. The Los Angeles Police Department continues to urge anyone with information regarding the fire at 1001 South Palos Verdes Street to contact Robbery-Homicide Division detectives or submit an anonymous tip through Crime Stoppers.
