Owner of exploding Michigan building arrested at airport while trying to leave US, authorities say

Source: Associated Press

Owner of exploding Michigan building arrested at airport while trying to leave US, authorities say

Updated 11:00 AM EDT, April 26, 2024

CLINTON TOWNSHIP, Mich. (AP) — The owner of a suburban Detroit business that caught fire and exploded, killing a man, was arrested at a New York airport as he was preparing to depart for Hong Kong on a one-way ticket, authorities said Friday.

U.S. Customs and New York Port Authority personnel arrested Noor Noel Kestou, 31, on Saturday at John F. Kennedy International Airport. He was brought back to Michigan on Wednesday.

Kestou, of Commerce Township, was arraigned Thursday on an involuntary manslaughter charge.

The March 4 fire and explosion occurred in a Clinton Township building that housed a distributor for the vaping industry called Goo. More than 100,000 vape pens were stored on-site. Authorities have said a truckload of butane canisters had arrived at the building within a week of the explosion that sent cannisters soaring up to 2 miles (3.2 kilometers), and more than half of that stock was still there when the fire began.

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Read more: https://apnews.com/article/industrial-fire-suburban-detroit-involuntary-manslaughter-charge-b99a83d9a7a360dd09846df52d8b0a40

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From March: 19-year-old who was quarter mile away from fiery explosion killed by flying canister: Michigan officials (ABC News)