Bronx District Attorney Darcel Clark has charged four contractors in connection to a fatal building collapse. 

The charges are in connection to allegedly falsified documents. Clark says this is the first-ever Bronx construction fatality case in which those who are responsible are being charged with manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide.  

Clark says that Augustine Adesanmi, Abazi Okoro, Fatos Mustafaj and Akhlak Choudhary failed to follow the law and failed to carry out basic construction site responsibilities. Okoro was allegedly paid $3,000 to be the onsite construction superintendent, but Clark says investigation found that to be false and that Okoro never went to visit the site.  

Adesanmi faces manslaughter charges. Adesanmi, Okoro and Choudhary are charged with criminally negligent homicide. Mustafaj and Adesanmi have been charged with grand larceny, and Choudhary faces four counts of offering a false instrument for filing. 

During the spring and summer of 2019, work continued on the site without a general qualified contractor or construction superintendent to monitor the work – which is what allegedly led to the death of 46-year-old Segundo Manuel Huerta Mayancela and the injuries of five other workers.  

Clark says Mayancela’s death led to the passage of Carlos’ Law to enforce accountability for tragic and avoidable injury to workers on New York construction sites, as well as an increase in fines up to $500,000 in the case of serious injury.