'Suspicious' Fire Kills Man

Camden Courier-Post — July 15, 1995

By Bruce Anderson, Courier-Post Staff

CAMDEN — An elderly man died Friday in a house fire that officials are labeling suspicious.

Percival "Poppy" Smith, 71, was found lying on the floor next to the bed in the front upstairs bedroom of his home at 1442 Rose Street, officials said. Neighbors reported he had lived in the house for several years.

"It could be a fire bombing," said Acting Camden County Prosecutor Joseph Audino. "All the damage was through the front of the home."

"Ace" Jackson, a boarder in the home, desperately attempted to save Smith, said a woman who lived nearby.

"He was trying to break down the door and crying, 'Poppy, Poppy,'" said Venus Harris of Atlantic Avenue. "Then there was a fiery explosion that burned his face and he had to give up. So I went to get help."

Harris called 9-1-1 at 2:44 p.m., said 3rd Battalion Chief Joseph Gallagher. Three minutes later, Gallagher said, his unit arrived to fight the blaze.

"The fire was out in 10 minutes so the hot weather wasn't a big problem," Gallagher added. "But the whole first floor and part of the second floor were totally burned. The fire also spread to the porch of 1444 Rose Street, where nobody was home."

Smith was pronounced dead at 4:40 p.m., said Audino. As his body was brought out three minutes later, Jackson's brown mixed-breed dog, Missy, walked forlornly back and forth in front of the house.

Audino said an autopsy would be performed today or Sunday, but that preliminary indications were that Smith died "as a result of the fire."

Smith lived in the home with his niece, Anita Harper, Jackson, and George Taylor, Audino said. It was not known whether anyone else besides Smith was in the house when the fire started.

The whereabouts of Jackson on Friday night were unclear.

Police are checking a report that residents of the Smith home were recently involved in an argument with another resident. "It's under investigation," Audino said.

One neighbor, who did not want to be identified, said some men "broke the windows on the first floor at least three times in the last few months."

Another bystander said a woman had tried to move into the house recently and, when she was refused, "threatened to burn it down."