Elio Olivero, co-owner of Petro Mobil on Plainfield Street, said one of the victims came into the store regularly. “She would come over here late at night, all the time,” he said.

The Providence Journal / Kathy Borchers Kathy Borchers

PROVIDENCE — A woman and a teenage girl were found dead in a burning Silver Lake triple-decker early yesterday, and the police say they are victims of a double-homicide.

Firefighters responding to a report of a fire at 381 Plainfield St. found Amanda Sousa, 17, of Providence, and Heather Jesus, 21, lying dead on the living room floor. Jesus lived in the apartment.

The police say that although they were found in a burning apartment, the actual cause of their death is unclear.

Some of the “evidence surrounding the victims” prompted fire officials to turn to the police for help investigating the fire on the third-floor, said Mark S. Pare, assistant chief of administration for the Providence Fire Department.

There are five apartments on the second and third floors of the building and the California Taco Shop on the first floor.

A half-dozen police officers combed the scene for several hours yesterday afternoon, checking the doors to the apartment, examining the inside and searching the grounds outside the house.

The bodies of both victims are at the medical examiner’s office, where autopsies are being performed, the police said. They said that the investigation continues, and would not release any additional information. The two become the fifth and sixth homicide victims in Providence this year.

The fire was reported at 1:59 a.m. and was under control by 2:30 a.m., Pare said.

Jose Diaz lives in a second-floor apartment directly beneath the apartment where the fire occurred.

He said that while he was trying to sleep, shortly before 2 a.m., he heard repeated heavy noises, “thumps” as he described them, coming from the apartment above.

“I got up and banged on the ceiling with a broom,” he said. Then the noises stopped, and he went back to bed.

Soon after, other neighbors pounded on his door to alert him that there was a fire and that he needed to evacuate.

As he stood in the street waiting to be allowed back in, he was shocked to see two bodies brought out on stretchers.

“I was just thinking it was a regular fire until I saw them bring the two bodies out,” he said.

In a house across the street, Tim Olasanoye watched the fire consume the apartment. “There was a lot of ash — I had to close my windows because my little brother was choking on it.”

He said that few people in the area know each other, but that the entire neighborhood was talking about the two girls’ deaths.

“That’s a shame, a real shame,” he said.

Elio Olivero co-owns the Petro Mobil across the street from the gutted apartment. He said that Jesus, who he said was pregnant, used to come in regularly to buy cigarettes.

“She would come over here late at night, all the time,” he said.

Cesar Morales owns a home next door to 381 Plainfield St. He said that it is a transient neighborhood and that few residents even know who their neighbors are. He said that people would come in and out of the apartment where the fire occurred at all hours of the night.

He also said that there was a serious fire in the same building a year ago, which caused heavy damage.

The Red Cross is assisting four adults and one child displaced by the fire, according to spokeswoman Marisa Albanese.

dbarbari@projo.com