Loafers Lodge fire trial: Crown says silenced alarm let second fire spread

Open Justice reporter - Wellington·NZ Herald·5 Oct, 2026 07:00 AM6 mins to read‌Pictured (clockwise from top left) are Barry Collins, Marie Murphy, Gregory Mein and Glenn McAllister who are on trial in the High Court at Wellington after the fatal fire at Loafers Lodge. Photo / RNZIn May 2023, a fatal fire at Loafers Lodge in the Wellington suburb of Newtown killed five people.In December, Esarona Lologa was convicted and sentenced on five counts of murder and one of arson for lighting the deadly blaze.Now company director Gregory Bruce Mein, property manager Marie Louise Murphy, and the building fire warden and residents Glenn Brendan McAllister, and Barry Charles Collins, who were responsible for the fire alarm, are on trial in the High Court at WellingtonEach faces five charges of manslaughter by omission to discharge their legal duty (being a dangerous thing), or five alternative charges of manslaughter by unlawful acts. If the fire safety system was working as it should have been at Loafers Lodge, five residents killed in a deadly blaze could have escaped the boarding house and survived. That’s the view of the Crown, which opened its case today against four people who were allegedly responsible for the