Man accused of starting La Casa Sena fire
Jul. 27—La Casa Sena, a popular downtown Santa Fe restaurant located in one of the city's best-known building complexes, was singed and soaked.
But it survived.
Police arrested a Santa Fe man suspected of starting a fire at the restaurant early Tuesday morning, accusing him of breaking into the Sena Plaza complex through a second-story window around 4:30, then setting the blaze. According to a Santa Fe Police Department news release, Joseph Duran was arrested and charged with arson, burglary and criminal damage to property.
Duran, who police said was found on the roof of the building, was taken to a local hospital after sustaining injuries. Rick Pedram, the president of the restaurant group that owns La Casa Sena, said Duran may have cut himself when breaking through a window prior to his arrest.
Duran, 35, was later booked into the Santa Fe County jail.
Capt. Jimmy St. James of the state Fire Marshal's Office said Duran told police he was under the influence of methamphetamines. Santa Fe police Capt. Bryan L. Martinez said he couldn't confirm any information beyond what the department issued in its Tuesday morning news release.
Pedram said damage from the fire was relatively minor, though areas were flooded by the building's sprinkler system, which forced the business to close Tuesday. He said he hopes the restaurant can open later this week.
Santa Fe businessman Gerald Peters, who owns Sena Plaza, said a sprinkler system was installed "after a bad fire" in the 1980s.
The Fire Marshal's Office, along with the Santa Fe Fire Department, helped douse the blaze.
Pedram said he believes Duran broke into the shopping complex to look for a place to use drugs and ended up in a storage room on the floor above the dining room area. He appeared to have entered through a window facing Palace Avenue, set off an alarm, then tried to crawl out of a window at the back of the complex, Pedram added.
After breaking the back window and sustaining injuries, Duran is suspected of using a small "blowtorch" lighter to set fire to the restaurant's linens, Pedram said.
"It's a shame that all this happened because of one individual wanting to [use drugs]," he said.
Pedram said he had a number of restoration companies on standby while the Fire Marshal's Office conducted its arson investigation.
An employee at Goler Fine Imported Shoes, located at Sena Plaza, said the incident was another example of how crime is changing Santa Fe.
"We're going to lose our revenue," said Alfonso Camarena, who has worked at the store for 25 years. "We need to pay our suppliers, we need to pay our employees — and this guy [is] maybe going to get, what, a week in jail ... and go off?"
Veronica Montoya has worked as a parking attendant at Sena Plaza for 27 years. She spent much of her time Tuesday moving barricades for confused shop owners and employees as they tried to go to work.
"There's just too much violence, there's too many drugs out there, the alcoholism, the firearms — it's just getting really, really out of hand," she said.
