Former North Philadelphia demolition contractor Griffin
Campbell spent Thursday as he has spent every day since Jan. 8 - serving a 15-
to 30-year prison term for his role in the deadly 2013 collapse that crushed a
Salvation Army store in Center City.
But he also appeared in a Philadelphia courtroom, telling
his version of what happened that June 5 in a video of his sworn deposition
recorded in January, two days after he was sentenced.
Campbell's deposition, whittled down to about nine hours,
will continue Friday in the Common Pleas Court civil trial of consolidated
lawsuits filed on behalf of the six people killed and 13 injured that day. One
of the injured died 23 days later.
When he testified at his criminal trial last October, and
again at his Jan. 8 sentencing, Campbell was often angry and argumentative.
In contrast, during the first of several days of
closed-to-the-public deposition testimony that began Jan. 8, Campbell seemed
relaxed and self-deprecating, at times laughing at how he got into his
predicament.
He seemed to get emotional only once, when he was asked
about Kim, his wife of 33 years, and their four daughters.
Campbell, 52, now in the state prison in Somerset in
Southwestern Pennsylvania, said his involvement in the demolition of five
buildings in the 2100 and 2200 blocks of Market Street was through Center City
architect Plato A. Marinakos Jr.
"I trusted this guy and he promised me work -
$300,000," Campbell testified. "Why wouldn't I take that
opportunity?"
After the collapse, Marinakos, now 50, hired a lawyer and
went to the District Attorney's Office. He got a grant of immunity from
prosecution and testified against Campbell at his trial.
Campbell described his personal situation in 2011:
bankrupt, owing $300,000 to a bank, and working to reinvent himself as a
building contractor after 18 years running a food truck at Broad Street and
Lehigh Avenue.
He had spent about $10,000 buying, rehabbing, and leasing
four dilapidated properties on Pike Street when a friend asked if he could
handle the demolition of a burned-out three-story rowhouse on Erie Avenue near
16th Street.
Campbell said he did not have a city contractor's
license, a company, equipment, or a corporate bank account, and had no
experience in demolition.
But his friend had hired Marinakos, not as an architect
but in his role as a licensed "expediter," who helped builders by
going to the Department of Licenses and Inspections and obtaining the necessary
permits for the work.
Campbell testified that he began the work after Marinakos
obtained the demolition permit using the license identification number of
another contractor.
A bond developed with Marinakos, Campbell said, and in
late 2012 Marinakos approached him saying, "I got something big going
on."
The project: demolishing five vacant and rundown
buildings owned by New York real estate speculator Richard Basciano and his STB
Investments Corp.
STB was planning a major retail-residential complex on
the site and Marinakos said it could be the beginning of lucrative work for
both of them, Campbell said.
Campbell said he was interested but told Marinakos he
still did not have a license, and had never bid a major project, or even
drafted and signed a contract.
"He said, 'I'll handle everything. I'll do the bids,
I'll do the contracts. You don't have to worry. You already have the job,'
" Campbell testified.
On June 5, 2013, an unsupported three- to four-story wall
remaining from STB's Hoagie City building toppled and crushed the Salvation
Army thrift store at 22nd and Market Streets.
Source: Philly.com
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