'We Didn't Deserve Any Of This': Flatbush Survivor Speaks Out

FLATBUSH— For more than a year, Flatbush residents lived with an unwelcome intruder next door, one whose presence was sanctioned despite the disruption it brought into their daily lives, said a survivor of the collapse.

Construction pounded on the walls and sent vibrations through the floorboards, long before the building collapsed Wednesday.

"You would hear that thump and that movement in your soul," Ciahola Lawrence, a resident at 1321 Flatbush Ave., said at a Friday news briefing.

Lawrence took off work Wednesday to recover from a headache, and when she closed the lights to rest around 3 p.m., she awoke to daylight.

"I couldn't believe I was seeing outside of my home," she said, turning to sob into her husband's chest.

Normalcy turned on its head, even the routines she took for granted, like accommodating her neighbor's large, 'fussy' family with multiple children.

"I saw that lady, and I didn't see the family," Lawrence said. "They're gone."

The eight victims identified in the collapse were:

• Nicole Daniela Salvada Rodriguez, 9.
• Kevin Santiago Reyes Gonzalez, 10.
• Juan Daniel Salvada Guzman, 31.
• Mamadou Bhoye N'diaye (Ndiaye Mamadou), 31, an Amazon worker from Guinea.
• Barry Mamadou, 23, a DoorDash delivery worker from Guinea.
• Gabriel Ariolfo Siguencia Yupa, 22.
• Edgar Sapon (Edgar Santiago Sapón Gutierrez), 26, a construction worker from Guatemala.
• Jose Luis Caguana Cosquillo, 26, a construction worker from Ecuador.

Mamadou Aliou Diallo, whose pregnant wife was among those injured, recounted leaving the apartment shortly before the collapse, only to return minutes later to find the building had come down with his wife and friends still inside.

Teenager Zariah Coleman said she rushed to the building to look for her cat but was stopped by police when she tried to cross the perimeter tape.

She said she spoke at the news conference because she's still waiting to find him.

Among the most vocal local officials in the aftermath has been Council Member Farah N. Louis, who represents Flatbush, and called for a sweeping investigation into the property's safety record and the agencies responsible for overseeing construction.

“Buildings do not simply collapse without systemic failure, especially when records show a building with nearly 100 open violations sitting next to an excavation site cited for violating stop-work orders," Louis said, alongside other city officials and victims' families.

The proposed development at 2625 Bedford Avenue stood to bring a markedly different kind of building to a neighborhood largely characterized by older, lower-rise residential properties.

Developers had been preparing the property for a proposed nine-story mixed-use building.

“When you look at the renderings of what the building was supposed to look like, compared with the buildings around it, nothing is the same,” said Amina, a Brooklyn resident.

She described the collapse as a physical manifestation of gentrification, questioning whether addressing the housing crisis requires building new, often luxury, developments in predominantly Black and historically underfunded neighborhoods.

A Department of Buildings violation initially attributed the collapse to unsafe construction operations at the Bedford Avenue site.

The agency quickly removed that language, telling Crain’s the description had been entered prematurely and was inaccurate.

The revised record cited a full stop-work order because of the collapse.

"We didn't deserve any of this," Lawrence said. "They came to kill us."

The Flatbush YMCA at 1401 Flatbush Avenue, between Flatbush and Rogers Avenues, became a resource center for displaced residents and families affected by the collapse.

City officials directed those in need to the facility for emergency assistance, shelter coordination and support services.

Residents looking to help have also been encouraged to contribute essential supplies and donations to support displaced families as they navigate the aftermath of the collapse.