Man Goes Free After 42 Years In Prison In Connection To Pioneer Hotel Fire

Man Imprisoned 42 Years for Hotel Fire to Go Free

In what appears to have been a major travesty of justice, 59-year-old Louis Cuen Taylor will go free after serving 42 years in an Arizona prison for the arson and wrongful deaths of the 29 people who died in a hotel blaze. In all likelihood, Taylor was probably in the wrong place at the wrong time.

At age 16, he was in the Pioneer Hotel during a Christmas party trying to get some free drinks. It was then that a fire broke out and quickly spread throughout the hotel; Taylor remained in the hotel to provide assistance to people and even tried to extinguish the blaze.

However, due to multiple factors such as a lack of sprinkler systems, inadequately short rescue ladders by the fire department, and emergency exists being locked, many people lost their lives in the fire.

Police later arrested Taylor and he was convicted of having started the blaze. Now, decades later a review of the evidence is inconclusive that arson was the cause of the fire much less Taylor being the instigator of it.

However, the prosecution was unwilling to overturn the sentence and Taylor agreed to plead “no contest” in exchange for his freedom. It is unclear if Taylor will pursue additional legal action to fully clear his name. He has always maintained his innocence.

On The Web:
Man held 42 years in deadly Tucson Pioneer Hotel fire to be released
http://azstarnet.com/news/local/man-held-years-in-deadly-tucson-pioneer-hotel-fire-to/article_984a194e-7c21-53d6-946e-ae1a1a53d303.html