Digital Extra: The Station Fire

Lawyers for Station nightclub owners Jeffrey and Michael Derderian say they learned of the information just last Thursday.

01:00 AM EST on Tuesday, November 8, 2005

BY BRUCE LANDIS
Journal Staff Writer

PROVIDENCE -- The company that sold highly flammable foam to control noise at The Station nightclub, where 100 people died in a fire in 2003, told its employees not to warn customers about the material they were buying, the salesman who sold the foam told investigators last week.

In a motion filed Friday, lawyers for Jeffrey and Michael Derderian, the West Warwick club's owners, said they learned of the information only last Thursday, when state prosecutors delivered to them "a large package" of material gathered in the case.

Included in the package was a document, anonymous at the time, which prosecutors received by fax in May 2003.

"If they warned the potential customer, they may lose the sale," the faxed document said of employees. "If they put a warning tag on the foam, it may scare the customer away."

"This is a company that did little to educate their employees about the limits of polyurethane foam. In fact, they did the opposite," the document said. It accused American Foam, of Johnston, of selling flammable foam "out the back door" without telling buyers "that it was not flame retardant foam."

The fax was signed, "Knowledgeable Source," but the court documents include a statement last week to state police by Barry Warner, an American Foam salesman at the time, confirming he sent the 2003 fax from a Kinko's Copies store in Warwick to the Kent County office of the attorney general.

Warner lived near the nightclub.

Although the fax went to the prosecutors in the spring of 2003, a state police report said the interview with Warner took place last Thursday, the same day the materials went to the defense lawyers.

The foam is a central issue in the case. Used to soundproof the club because of neighbors' complaints about noise, it ignited and burned ferociously when the band Great White set off pyrotechnics during a show on the night of Feb. 20, 2003.

The Derderians, the club's owners, and Daniel Biechele, former tour manager for Great White, are charged with 200 counts of involuntary manslaughter. They are also the targets of civil lawsuits. All three have pleaded innocent.

In a motion to dismiss the charges against the Derderians, defense lawyers had already argued that American Foam knew that the foam was to be used for soundproofing. The new information shows the company's "apparent active and knowing concealment of the properties of its product," they said.

The new defense motion asks Judge Francis J. Darigan for 10 days to review the materials from the prosecution and possibly to file more arguments in favor of dismissal.

Thomas M. Dickinson, one of the defense lawyers, said last night that lawyers from both sides met with Darigan on Friday. He said that the defense needs time to evaluate the new information and decide how it fits into their legal strategy.

Officials of American Foam could not be reached last night. Warner declined to comment.