He was not hiding in advance of an attack; he was seeking shelter after a fire was already burning.

“In any case, he made no attempt to get out,” Vagalinski said in a statement that appears across multiple news reports.

Whether he was unable to exit — trapped by the fire, overcome by smoke, or collapsed — or whether he made no attempt because he was unconscious or incapacitated before he could try will remain speculative without forensic evidence of cause of death.

The Surrounding Evidence: A City In Crisis