First of Five Men Charged in Corral Fire Pleads No Contest

• He Is Expected to Testify against Others

BY HANS LAETZ

A man described by his lawyer as the least-culpable defendant in last November’s catastrophic Corral Canyon Fire has turned state’s evidence and will testify against his four defendants, prosecutors announced Wednesday.
Brian David Franks, who is now 28, entered a no contest plea to a felony charge of recklessly causing a fire Wednesday. Prosecutors said they would ask for five years probation, and the performance of 300 hours of community service, when Van Nuys Superior Court Judge Leslie Dunn sentences him Nov. 3.
Franks is the first to be convicted in connection with the Nov. 24, 2007, fire that claimed 53 houses and caused at least $513 million in damages. That wildfire was deemed capable of taking out houses all the way to the tip of Point Dume until a lucky wind shift blew it back on itself. One firefighter was seriously injured in the firefighting effort.
The district attorney’s office said Franks will be used as a witness against his two one-time friends, Brian Alan Anderson and William Thomas Coppock, who reportedly are deemed more responsible for the arson.
According to arson investigation reports read into the record by a judge at a bail hearing, Anderson, Coppock and Franks stole bundles of firewood and bought beer and vodka at the Ralph’s store in Malibu, and paid for purchases with an ATM card.
The trio then drove to the “rave cave” at the north end of Corral Canyon, past signs warning against open flames, and into hot, dry winds that were blowing that night in excess of 74 miles per hour, the standard for a hurricane.
Investigators believe the trio of Los Angeles men encountered recent Culver City High School graduates Eric Matthew Ullman and Dean Allen Lavorante, who had built a small bonfire in the cave to entertain their girlfriends. The three men allegedly humiliated the younger men in front of the women, and forced the two men and their dates to leave.
According to the police reports, Anderson and Coppock then got drunk and built a roaring fire with the stolen firewood, kicked burning logs out of the cave and down a cliff, and forced Franks to go down into the brush to stomp out embers. A burning pillow was also thrown at Franks, according to the reports.
Franks has a criminal record consisting of a past failure to fasten a seat belt, and has worked his entire life either at a McDonald’s restaurant near his house, or after it opened, the Starbucks across the street, and had been taken in years ago by a family that has known him since he was child.
Because he was unable to post bail, unlike the other defendants, Franks spent more than three months, including Christmas, in jail before county prosecutors agreed to release him on his own recognizance.
The Culver City men’s arraignment was postponed again last Friday, as prosecutors and defense attorneys work on a possible plea deal. Anderson and Coppock face a preliminary hearing setting hearing on Oct. 17.