Fire investigators from the Oakland County Sheriff’s Department are blaming careless smoking as the cause of a mobile home fire that took the life of an Orion Township woman on Dec. 5.
The Orion Township Fire Department and OCSD responded to the fire at a mobile home on Mockingbird, located in the Orion Lakes Mobile Home Park off of Brown Road, about 12:30 p.m. on Friday. According to an OCSD report, the mobile home was fully engulfed in flames when they arrived. A 34-year-old man on the scene was yelling that his wife, 54-year-old Milly Christine Roper, was inside the home at the time of the fire.
After the fire was put out, OCSD investigators were able to enter the home and locate the victim’s body. The man said his wife was handicapped and confined to a bed, and was also taking heavy medication at the time which made her sleepy.
He told the OCSD that he worked for the mobile home park, and that he had been driving towards his home when he saw heavy smoke coming from the direction of his mobile home. He said he tried to enter the home, but the heat and smoke were too much, and that he was sure his wife was inside at the time of the fire.
The Oakland County Medical Examiner identified the body found in the home as that of Milly Roper. OCSD fire investigators orginally thought a hot wax machine overheating in the living room was the cause of the fire.