Police: 4 killed in house fire in Lacey Township, N.J.

LACEY TOWNSHIP, N.J. — An Ocean County, New Jersey community was in mourning Tuesday after four people died in a house fire.

Neighbors said nine were living in the home, a family with three generations.

CBS New York spoke to one man who helped save the grandmother, but in the end he said four people, including a baby, were trapped inside.

The home on a picket-fenced block in Lacey Township was reduced to melted window frames.

“We heard screaming. I was like, ‘Oh my God, the kids are still in the house,’” neighbor Robert Juska said.

Juska said he ran toward danger when he saw his neighbor’s house on fire along Buttonwood Drive just after 12 p.m.

“I jump the back fence. A neighbor from over there, we jumped and the cops were coming as we were going back,” Juska said.

He found the family’s grandmother hanging out the back window.

“She was coming out of the top window. She jumped down, but she snapped her leg. She was trying to go back in the house to save the kids, but she passed out on the ground by the door,” Juska said. “So we picked her up and carried her out here and then she was telling us there were four more people in the house and I was like, ‘Who?’ And she was like, ‘the kids.’”

He said the youngest inside was 6 months old.

The Ocean County Prosecutor’s Office said firefighters tried to save them, but the roof collapsed and all the crews had to evacuate.

“All the black smoke was coming over the trees, and within a matter of minutes the whole neighborhood was covered. Smoke all over. It was thick. It was bad, very scary,” neighbor John Trusso said.

Crews spent the day trying to cool the smoldering wood, as neighbors mourned for those trapped inside.

“It has been a rough day, real rough day,” Juska said.

Police said the woman who survived was treated for injuries at the hospital.

Investigators are now trying to figure out how the fire started.