A 38-year-old Queens man allegedly walked into a gas station, grabbed matches, and set fire to a random apartment building in Flushing because he was angry about being fired, killing four people, including a three-year-old child, prosecutors said.

Roman Amatitla now faces multiple counts of murder, arson, and assault for the March 16, 2026, blaze at 132-05 Avery Avenue. He pleaded not guilty at his arraignment in Queens Criminal Court and is being held without bail.

Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz called the fire "one of the greatest crimes this borough has seen in a long time." She spoke Thursday after Amatitla's court appearance, laying out a sequence of events that reads less like a crime of passion and more like a deliberate act of destruction aimed at strangers who had nothing to do with his grievance.

What prosecutors say happened on March 16

Amatitla lost his food processing job that same day, prosecutors said. He had gotten into a fight at work before being fired. Authorities said he told investigators he was looking for a way to relieve his anger.

He allegedly went to a nearby gas station, bought a beer, and obtained matches. Then, prosecutors said, he walked to the multi-floor building on Avery Avenue, a building where he had no connection to any resident, lit a piece of paper on top of garbage in the first-floor hallway, and watched the fire take hold while drinking beers.

The four-alarm blaze trapped residents inside. Five people jumped from windows at different points in the building trying to escape. Firefighters arrived to find the structure engulfed.

Three victims, 3-year-old Sihan Yang, Chie Shin Ming, and 50-year-old Chengri Cui, were found dead after firefighters extinguished the flames. Authorities said all three died of smoke inhalation.

The fourth victim, Hong Zhao, jumped from a window. Katz described what happened next:

"It was so traumatic and so painful that he jumped out the window and died from his fractures."

Zhao died of head and bodily injuries from the fall.

Survivors suffered broken ribs, brain injuries, and severe burns

Court documents described the toll on those who survived by jumping. Hospitalized victims suffered broken ribs, a traumatic brain injury, and severe burns. Two FDNY members, a lieutenant and a firefighter, were also injured when a stairwell collapsed beneath them, sending both into the basement.

The sheer randomness of the target makes the case all the more disturbing. Amatitla had no relationship with anyone in the building. Prosecutors said he chose it because he wanted "someone" to pay for his anger. The New York Post reported that Queens Assistant District Attorney Gabriel Reale told the court what Amatitla allegedly said to investigators:

"He said he had to get his rage out on someone or something."

Reale also told the court that Amatitla did not leave after setting the fire. Instead, he allegedly stood outside and watched as residents tried to save themselves.

"He indicated that he watched as people jumped from various windows, some of them living, one of them dying."

That detail, a man standing on the sidewalk, drinking a beer, watching people leap from a burning building he allegedly set, is the kind of fact that speaks for itself. It does not need editorial embellishment. It needs a courtroom.

A three-year-old among the dead

Sihan Yang was three years old. The child was found dead inside the building after the fire was put out. No amount of prosecutorial language captures what it means for a toddler to die of smoke inhalation in a hallway fire allegedly set by a stranger settling a score with no one in particular. In a city that has seen no shortage of shocking violent crimes, the death of a child in a random act of arson stands apart.

Katz framed the broader scene bluntly:

"This was really pandemonium. What led up to the fire is really quite disturbing."

Defense says charges are not a conviction

Amatitla's lawyer, Vivian Cedeño, offered a brief statement after the arraignment:

"A charge is not a conviction. We intend to vigorously represent him."

That is her right and her duty. The legal process will run its course. But the facts prosecutors have put on the record, the matches, the beer, the hallway fire, the watching, paint a picture of calculated indifference to human life that will be difficult to explain away.

Amatitla remains held without bail. The specific counts and statutes in the criminal complaint have not been publicly detailed beyond the categories of murder, arson, and assault. No case number has been released. The name of his former employer and the food processing job he lost have not been disclosed.

What this case says about accountability

Violent crime in New York City has a way of becoming background noise, another headline, another arraignment, another set of victims whose names fade within a news cycle. The legal system's response to cases like this one matters. Holding Amatitla without bail was the right first step. Whether the system follows through with the seriousness the case demands remains an open question, one that courtroom outcomes across the country have given New Yorkers reason to watch closely.

Four people are dead. A toddler is dead. Firefighters nearly died in a collapsing stairwell. Survivors are recovering from brain injuries and burns. And all of it, prosecutors say, because one man lost a job and decided strangers should pay the price.

The victims of 132-05 Avery Avenue did nothing wrong. They lived in a building a stranger picked at random. If the justice system cannot deliver accountability for them, it is hard to say what it is for.