Fire at Warren home where homicide took place ‘suspicious’

Staff report

WARREN

A suspicious fire Thursday night that destroyed a vacant house on South Street Southeast occurred at the same place where James R. Levels was shot to death in April.

Warren Fire Chief Ken Nussle said his department was called to 918 South St. at 10:57 p.m. and found the home fully engulfed in flames. All they could do was wage a defensive attack, he said.

The home was a complete loss, with damage listed at $22,000. Firefighters remained at the scene until 3:30 a.m.

The utilities had been turned off. The owner of the home, Robert Edwards of Leavittsburg, said he had been in the home within recent days and doesn’t believe there were squatters using it.

The home is a danger in its present condition and needs to be torn down right away, Nussle said.

On April 7, 48-year-old Lisa Prater told a dispatcher over and over on a 911 call “We got shot, we got shot” after two males broke into the home and tried to rob her and Levels, 64, of Beal Street Northwest.

Levels was unresponsive when emergency personnel arrived. Prater was treated at ValleyCare Trumbull Memorial Hospital for two gunshot wounds but survived.

No arrests have been made in the attack.

The April gunfire was not the only trouble reported at the residence in the past year, with gunfire reported in October 2013 and again in December 2013.

In a separate matter, Prater was sentenced to five years’ probation June 17 in Trumbull County Common Pleas Court after pleading guilty to crack-cocaine possession. The date of that offense was Jan. 1.