The University Ridge blaze injured residents and firefighters, displaced 18 people and led authorities to charge a tenant’s daughter with arson.
DURHAM, N.C. — Smoke alarms sounded as flames spread through the University Ridge Apartments, forcing one man from a third-story window and sending firefighters through heavy fire to rescue another resident from the first floor.
The late-morning emergency injured seven people and left all 18 apartments in the affected building uninhabitable, according to fire officials and court reports. Prosecutors say the destruction was intentional. They have charged 31-year-old Mahogany Ashley Massey with first-degree arson, three arson counts tied to serious firefighter injuries and three counts of assault inflicting serious bodily injury. Massey was ordered held without bond after a judge found that she posed a danger to the community. The allegations remain unproven.
Fire crews were dispatched to the complex on University Drive at about 10:53 a.m. Sunday. The first units arrived within minutes and reported heavy fire conditions. Flames later pushed through the roof, a sign that the fire had spread beyond the room or unit where it began. Crews made at least one rescue through a first-floor window while other residents found their own ways out. It took firefighters about an hour to bring the blaze under control.
Justice Houllier, a 28-year-old resident, said he first heard an alarm in the apartment below him. His own alarm began sounding soon afterward. The warning gave him little time to decide what to take or where to go. As conditions worsened, Houllier said, he grabbed his contact lens case and moved toward a living-room window rather than trying to save furniture, clothes or other property.
Houllier jumped from the third floor. He said he landed on his feet and immediately felt pain in his back. He later learned that he had fractured his spine and badly injured a foot, WRAL reported. Speaking a day after the fire while wearing a back brace, he said possessions could be replaced and described his decision as a fight-or-flight response. His name was made public because he chose to speak about his escape.
Elsewhere in the building, prosecutors said Massey’s brother went back inside to reach their mother. During the rescue attempt, glass shattered in the heat and struck his arm, severing an artery, according to the prosecution’s courtroom account. The prosecutor said he nearly bled to death. Massey’s mother suffered severe smoke inhalation and remained hospitalized when authorities described her condition the following day.
Three Durham firefighters were among those identified in court documents as injured. Officials did not publicly provide their names or a complete description of their injuries in the reports reviewed for this article. Early coverage varied in how it counted the injured residents and firefighters, but the Fire Department and local stations consistently reported seven injuries overall and multiple hospital transports.
The rescue effort ended without a reported death, but the fire removed an entire building from the city’s housing supply. Fire officials said the structure contained 18 apartments, nine of which were occupied. All 18 units were declared unlivable, and 18 residents were displaced. The reports did not say when repairs might begin, whether the building could be restored or how many residents had found permanent replacement housing.
The building’s age became part of the public discussion after the fire. Property records cited by WRAL indicate that it was built in the 1980s. The structure did not have an automatic sprinkler system. State requirements covering sprinklers in apartment construction changed after the complex was built, and fire officials did not identify the lack of sprinklers as a code violation in the available reports.
Sprinklers and alarms perform different jobs. Alarms warn occupants of smoke or fire, while sprinklers are designed to control flames near their point of origin. In this fire, Houllier’s account indicates that alarms provided warning, but the available reporting does not establish when each device activated, whether every alarm worked or how the absence of sprinklers affected the spread. Investigators had not released a formal technical report addressing those questions.
The Fire Department quickly classified the blaze as arson, according to news reports. Authorities then identified Massey as the suspect and took her into custody. Publicly available accounts do not explain what first directed investigators toward her, how they determined the fire had been deliberately set or what physical evidence they collected. No ignition device, accelerant result or surveillance footage was described in the reports reviewed.
Massey’s mother lived at the complex, investigators said. Prosecutors alleged that a document found among Massey’s belongings contained a “people to kill list.” They did not release the document, identify the people named on it or say whether each person had a connection to University Ridge. It is also unclear whether the phrase was written on the document itself or was the prosecution’s description of its contents. Those distinctions matter because the list is being cited as possible evidence of intent, while the arson charges require proof about the fire itself. Prosecutors would have to show that Massey committed the burning and possessed the mental state required for each offense. The defense can challenge the origin, meaning and relevance of any writing as well as the investigation that linked Massey to the scene.
Prosecutors also said Massey had tried to set a fire at the complex about a week before the larger blaze. WRAL reported that it asked the Fire Department about that assertion but had not received confirmation. Authorities did not provide a date, damage report or separate charge connected to the alleged earlier attempt. No witness account or incident report supporting that claim was included in the public coverage.
At Massey’s first court appearance, the immediate issue was whether she should remain jailed while the case proceeded. Prosecutors relied on the seriousness of the alleged conduct, the injuries and the document they described as a list of intended victims. The judge ordered Massey held without bond after ruling that she presented a danger to the community.
A defense lawyer urged the court to consider mental health treatment rather than continued detention. Massey’s father, Daron Massey, separately told ABC11 that his daughter has a history of serious mental illness and had stopped taking medication about two months before the fire. He said he had previously sought involuntary commitment for her but could not force her to continue treatment after she was released.
The father also described Massey’s behavior at the fire scene. He said she remained seated while her injured mother was taken toward an ambulance, smoking a cigarette and drinking a beer rather than approaching. The account has drawn attention because of the contrast between the emergency unfolding nearby and the behavior he described. It remains one witness’s account and does not by itself prove who started the fire or establish a legal motive.
Reports said Massey repeatedly interrupted the court hearing. The judge continued the proceeding without her present. The public reporting did not indicate whether the court ordered a mental health evaluation or whether the defense formally raised a question about her competency. A person’s diagnosis and legal competency are not interchangeable, and any ruling would require a separate court process based on evidence. The case now carries two parallel sets of consequences. The criminal court will examine who started the fire and whether the charged offenses can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. Outside court, survivors must deal with injuries, destroyed property and sudden displacement. Firefighters must also account for injuries suffered during a response that placed crews inside a heavily burning structure.
Officials have not released a full after-action report, an estimated dollar loss or a final cause-and-origin narrative. The names of most injured residents remain private, and no detailed update has been published about the recovery of Massey’s mother, her brother or the firefighters. Those limits leave significant parts of the event known only through early court statements and interviews recorded within a day of the fire.
At the latest publicly confirmed point, Massey remained in the Durham County Detention Center under the judge’s no-bond order. No conviction has been entered, and the sources available for this report did not confirm the result of any proceeding held after her initial appearance. The prosecution’s account, the defense response and the fire investigation will require further testing as the case moves through court.
Author note: Last updated July 15, 2026.