A judge has frozen the assets of the person who owns the Noyes Street apartment building in Portland that burned last month, resulting in six deaths.
Justice Joyce Wheeler froze $1.7 million of landlord Gregory Nisbet's assets, ruling he is likely to have to pay more than that in damages in a suit filed by the family of victim Steven Summers.
Attorney Tom Hallett is representing Summer's wife, Ashley, and Summer's two young children. Hallett says they filed motions to attach any and all assets that the landlord has over and above any insurance policy that might be in effect.
"We learned that the insurance policy that is in effect is a $300,000 insurance policy, which is woefully inadequate to over the damages arising out of the fire," Hallett says.
Hallett says the purpose of the suit is to get Summer's wife enough money to provide for the children, and to give her the kind of funds that would have been available had her husband survived.