A Community Rising: Davenport Collapse 1 Year Later

In 1907, construction was completed on The Hotel Davenport. Located at the corner of Main and Fourth Streets in Davenport, the six-story structure was comprised of brick over steel and concrete. It was located between Union Station and the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad station. According to the Davenport Public Library, The Hotel Davenport cost around $260,000 to build. 

Construction of The Hotel Davenport, or the Davenport Hotel, ushered in a period of tall buildings in Davenport's central business district, which is now the downtown area. This included the Blackhawk Hotel built just years later in 1915. According to the National Archives Catalog, the Davenport Hotel was "seriously and permanently injured" by the new hotel and was eventually sold to the Blackhawk Hotel Company in 1916. 

76 years after being built, the Davenport Hotel was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1983. By that point, the former hotel had been converted into residential apartments with commercial spaces on the first floor. It was bought and sold over the years before being bought in 2021 by Davenport Hotel LLC, which is owned by Andrew Wold. 

City records and information in a class action lawsuit following the collapse document years of issues and substandard conditions at the Davenport Hotel, which includes the west wall that came down on May 28, 2023. 

READ MORE: 1 year since the Davenport collapse: Where legal proceedings stand

Just a month after the sale in 2021, the City of Davenport sent a "Complaint Notice and Order" to Davenport Hotel LLC documenting substandard conditions along the west wall. In that document, it says a resident had reported an exit door on the west wall was difficult to open and that the drywall around it was not stable. 

Fast forward to Feb. 2, 2023 — mere months before the collapse — the City issued a Notice of Public Hazard to Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC. Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC had hired Select Structural Engineering LLC to perform an emergency inspection due to increasing complaints, the lawsuit says. Allegedly, it was the first time a structural engineering company was hired to inspect the building since that first notice from the City in 2021 after the building was bought. 

Select Structural concluded that the damaged area on the west wall was "not an imminent danger to the entire building and its residents" but that two beams needed to be shored with heavy posts to make repairs. One of those beams, according to the inspection summary, supported the second level of the building. 

Later that month on Feb. 28, Select Structural issued an addendum to its initial Feb. 2 report after a follow-up visit where they found "a large and potentially dangerous void beneath the facade wythe of clay brick." Debris was piling in the gap, causing the brick facade to bulge. Select Structural said it would soon cause a large panel of the facade to collapse, "creating a safety problem and potentially destabilizing the upper areas of brick facade." The engineering company recommended removing bricks from the bowing area "in a safe, controlled manner" and then installing a CMU (concrete masonry unit) wall in that removed area.

However, once work was started on building that new CMU wall, Davenport's Chief Building Officer at the time, Trishna Pradhan, filed a notice on March 9 to halt work due to the materials not matching the original brick. Since The Davenport was a historic landmark, city code requires any visible repairs to match the building material unless otherwise approved.

The lawsuit says additional work was done during March and April, however, the required shoring was never completed. 

Days before the collapse on May 23, 2023, Select Structural returned to 324 Main St. and noted numerous "dire conditions" on the west wall, according to the lawsuit. The company noted the area appeared "ready to fall imminently" and that the area was bulging out several inches. 

Photos from a May 25 inspection by Pradhan and Davenport's Director of Development and Neighborhood Services Richard Oswald show just how far the building was bulging out on the west side. The photos also show a pair of two-by-fours perched against the building which the lawsuit alleges Wold/Davenport Hotel LLC did "to make it look like they were complying with the City’s requirements to provide bracing to the exterior wall."

Just days before the collapse, Andrew Shaffer with R.A. Masonry warned contractors working on the building about the dangers. Shaffer says Wold had approached him in February about doing the repairs recommended by Select Structural. He said he thought the bid they gave was reasonable, but Wold rejected it because the cost was too high. Shaffer and his crew walked away, he said, because of his concerns about the safety of the building.

On May 26, 2023, Shaffer said he saw windows shattering on the west wall. The next day, he told contractors working on the building, "Get away from there. You're gonna die." 

One of those contractors ended up calling 911 on Saturday, May 27, to have the building checked out. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, News 8 learned that Davenport Fire was at the scene for four minutes before leaving. An email from the City in mid-June said the reason the firefighters left so soon was because they "observed active work occurring and external shoring was in place and observable."  

"They observed that the external shoring was in place with no observable signs of difficulty or bowing in the external shoring," the email read. "Once inspectors left, work continued on the building on May 27 and throughout the day on Sunday, May 28."

The next day, on May 28 at 4:55 p.m., the building's west wall collapsed. 

Six stories on the west side of The Davenport building collapsed in the blink of an eye that Sunday. One of downtown Davenport’s flagship buildings had fallen to the ground, carrying residents and their homes with it. 

Immediately after the first call to dispatch, dozens of first responders flooded the scene. Police body camera video showed what happened as authorities arrived and found the western portion of the building in a heap of rubble. Body cam footage showed workers who had been trying to shore up the building near the rubble, shocked by the collapse.

“We were trying to brace it, we had it all braced,” a worker told a police officer.

More officers arrived near the Davenport Public Library across the street shortly afterward, blocking off the intersection and assisting in the evacuation of nearby buildings. 

“Let’s start evacuating this way. The whole backside is gone,” a police officer said at 5:02 p.m.

About 20 minutes after the collapse, Davenport Fire Marshal Jim Morris began gathering officials to enter the partially collapsed building.

“I need everybody that you have right here, right here so we can start coordinating, evacuating the building,” Morris said while standing in the intersection of North Main Street and W. 4th Street.

Police officers escorted residents out of the building and across the street to St. Anthony Catholic Church, where a temporary shelter was established.

At 5:20 p.m., eight first responders walk into the building intending to evacuate any remaining residents. About 90 seconds after walking in, the first responders detected natural gas in the building and decided to exit. 

As authorities exited the building, residents’ families began gathering outside the building, concerned that their loved ones were still inside.

In the hours that followed, several residents hurried outside to safety, but Peach Berry was trapped beneath the rubble and separated from her wife Lexus. Peach fell from their fourth-story apartment into the rubble, with two more stories landing on top of her.

“Cement just stacked up, like on the side of my head. And I did have my arms free so I was moving a few things so that I could breathe. I was scared. I didn't know where she was. I was terrified that she was under something that she couldn't get out of,” Peach said.

Lexus led police officers to the spot where Peach fell from.

“I knew that she fell because I heard her scream from behind me. I was freaking out because I had no idea where my wife was,” Lexus said. 

Peach was trapped for eight hours before an emergency amputation of her left leg freed her from the rubble.

In the hours after the building collapsed, Iowa Task Force 1, a specialized group from Cedar Rapids and Sioux City designed to be deployed during emergencies, arrived on the scene. 

Task Force 1 Water Rescue Manager Colton Dall said, “It was a little eerie. Going there, you kind of just try to get a kind of a game plan in your head, kind of just mentally prepare, for once you get there. There was no power to the building, so just was kind of dark, cold, just wasn't a great feeling."

The team was immediately tasked with shoring the building, always working with structural engineers to find the safest spots to enter. To search areas that were not accessible to the rescue workers, Task Force 1 used cadaver dogs or searched for voids that a camera could fit into. 

“We tried to get into an apartment and we weren’t able to get in. We put our search camera in and right below us there was nothing, the entire apartment was gone and it was a straight drop into the rubble,” Dall said.

The dogs alerted to the workers three to six different times, indicating that they had found something.

“It was tough. We knew their families were outside,” said Dall.

In the initial response, Task Force 1 was operating as a search and rescue operation. It wasn't until the team left and came back a few days later did the team shift to a recovery operation, searching for the bodies of Branden Colvin Sr., Ryan Hitchcock and Daniel Prien. 

“It's sacred hallowed ground that this person perished and expired right here at this location… once we find the victim it's kind of that moment of silence,” Archer said.

The bodies of Colvin Sr., Hitchcock and Prien were located between June 3-5. They had originally been among a group of five people that were unaccounted for.

The State Medical Examiner ruled that all three men had the same cause and manner of death. The cause was multiple blunt force injuries with mechanical asphyxia, the manner was accidental.

On June 7, when the Davenport City Council met for the first time following the collapse, protestors stood outside before the meeting demanding accountability.

Demolition of the remaining structure at 324 Main St. began on Monday, June 12. By June 21, the city reported the building as completely dismantled.

Survivors and family members of those killed continue to feel the impact of the tragedy one year later. 

Ryan Hitchcock, Branden Colvin Sr. and Daniel Prien all lost their lives in the collapse — each one found in the rubble days later. Peach and Lexus Berry were heading out the door when the west wall fell, taking Peach four stories down and trapping her in the rubble. She was rescued eight hours later with an emergency amputation of her leg. Two others, Linnea Hoover and Vincent McClain, lost all of their personal belongings in the collapse and were displaced, along with dozens of others who resided in The Davenport apartments. 

Family members of those who died

Prien's daughter, Nancy Frezza, lives in Tennessee. She remembers learning about what happened when a member of the media reached out to her husband.

"Just like, 'I don't know if you know, I don't know if you've heard, but your father-in-law was involved or was living at a place where the building came crashing down. Do you know where he is?'" Frezza said. "Those three days my world stood still. And when I found out they found him, I was driving and I had to pull over. I couldn't stop crying because I was hoping and praying that he was not in there."

Frezza didn't grow up with her dad. She met him online for the first time when she was 16 and then later in person five years ago when she spent some time living with him.

"He was a really good grandfather figure and a dad," she said. "I saw how much of like a happy person he was and a sweet person he was. He would give anybody anything, even though he barely had anything."

It's hard for her to know she and her sons missed out on spending more time with Prien.

Since last year, Frezza has spent time talking with her dad's old girlfriend and trying to learn more stories about him. She's learned Prien worked in the circus scene and was in the Marines at one point. Now, she's trying to teach her oldest son, Ezra, about him.

"I want people to remember my dad not as a homeless person, but as a father, as a grandfather, as a brother, as a son," she said. "Not what he was, like who he was and he has family that love him and miss him."

Ryan Hitchcock's family remembers him as a generous person who loved music. He worked in the IT department at Arconic.

"He would jump into everything with both feet," said his uncle Scott Morehart. "I think I brought home a computer when he was like 12 or 13, maybe a little older, and he took off from there... Before I knew it, he needed more storage memory. So it was always something about the computer."

The two used to watch "The Walking Dead" together on Wednesday nights. Hitchcock's cousin Nathan Morehart remembers him giving him his first comic book collection.

"Ryan was eight, almost nine years older than me, but I grew up basically under his tutelage in lots of pop culture, music, movies, sci-fi, computer games, all these things we shared," Nathan said. "I talked to him every day pretty much. I would have online chats with him throughout the day and he'd always call me on his way home from work... It's day to day. Sometimes you still kind of think the call's coming. And it's, it's not."

"He had his rocking horse and he fell asleep on that," his mom Linda Feliksiak remembers. "He was very easy to be with, you know?"

Peach and Lexus Berry

Peach and Lexus Berry lived on the fourth floor of 324 Main St. It was a normal Sunday night and the couple was home about to prepare dinner when they heard noises before the floor of their apartment collapsed. 

"We were literally about to head out the door," Peach said. "She (Lexus) already had her hand on the door, but literally within that second everything fell."

Peach fell four stories down, with two more stories falling on top of her. Lexus stood on a singular square foot of flooring that remained in the apartment — allowing her to walk out of the building. 

Somehow, Peach did not break a single bone in the fall. She was trapped underneath the rubble for eight hours and held pieces of debris in front of her face to prevent the broken sprinkler system from drowning her. 

News 8's Joe McCoy asked Peach if she ever felt she was going to die that day.

"There was a moment, but then my survival skills kicked in and it was like 'No, this isn't it for you, you're going to live to tell your story,'" she said. "Dying wasn't an option that day."

Peach was eventually freed from the rubble with an emergency amputation of her left leg. But the only thing she cared about was knowing if her wife was alive.

"Hearing her voice when they did get me dug out was just the biggest relief," Peach said. "At that point, I didn't care because I just wanted to live and get out of there, I just wanted that nightmare to end."

Unfortunately, it was just the start of Peach's recovery. She has had four surgeries in the year since and attends physical therapy twice a week. She hopes to be walking with her prosthetic leg by the end of the year. 

"Taking it day by day, as best as I can," Peach said. "Because some days are definitely harder than others." "I'm so proud of you," Lexus said chiming in. "You're doing amazing."

The couple moved to Chicago a month and a half after the collapse. They are still adjusting to a new city and a different and more challenging way of life. 

Linnea Hoover

Former WQAD Photojournalist Linnea Hoover now lives more than 1,500 miles southwest of the Quad Cities in Phoenix, Arizona. 

She was living at 324 Main St. on the day it partially collapsed, May 28, 2023. Hoover was planning on moving out of the building within 24 hours of the disaster, all of her belongings boxed up inside her apartment.

Hoover got out of the building just minutes after the collapse with just the clothes on her back, car keys, and cell phone.

"Oh my f***ing god," Hoover said in a panicking voice right after getting out of the building.

One year later, she said there are memories from that day she will never forget.

"I won't forget the people. I won't forget the people who were there in the aftermath, who were trying to make sure we got to safety," she said. "I'll remember the look on my neighbor's faces, as we all kind of realized what was happening. I'll remember the sounds like the sound of running water coming out of the building."

"I prefer being outside now. I feel uncomfortable in most buildings," she added. "Now, I'm always looking for what's wrong with a building before I go into it, and I'm not sure that's ever really going to leave."

Vincent McClain

Life for Vincent McClain and his dog, Kodiak, is calm these days — but rebuilding his life has been a long journey.

McClain and Kodiak moved to the Quad Cities seven years ago. Kodiak was by his side when he could finally afford his own apartment at 324 Main St.

“You think 'Everything is going to be okay,' where your life is going to get better, and you're finally on the right track," McClain said. Alongside his ragtag family of snakes, lizards and a cat, they were all ready to call Davenport home. But three weeks after moving into the apartment, it all came crashing down.

McClain was separated from Kodiak after the collapse. 

“To have her there, and to be having to beg people to bring her out of the building. It was heartbreaking knowing that they might not," he said.

Now a year later, rebuilding their lives again has been another difficult journey. McClain said aid from the city and state hasn't been enough. 

“The most they gave us was six grand. That's it. In this economy, six grand doesn't go very far," McClain said. 

He had to start from scratch yet again, struggling for aid while on unemployment after recently losing his job. 

After all this time, coming back to downtown Davenport is tough. Despite that, being tough is what McClain and Kodiak are all about.

“Days like today when I can go out with my dog… those are small, happy moments that make it worth it to keep going.”

More questions than answers remain on who will be held accountable for the tragic event.  

In the days and months following May 28, 2023, family members of the three men who died, several surviving residents and businesses impacted by the collapse filed lawsuits against Wold, his LLCs, the City of Davenport and other parties. All of the individual lawsuits were consolidated in late September and have now become a class action lawsuit, court documents show. 

Court records show the case isn't set for trial until at least January 2026. As the case moves forward, it is likely some of the counts could be removed.

As of May 2024, there are 27 counts against various defendants in the case, including 16 counts of common law negligence, one count of negligence per se and five nuisance counts. Wold and his multiple LLCS face one count of piercing the corporate veil and the other four involve Wold allegedly selling off multiple properties after the collapse at less than market value to rid of his assets. The lawsuit accuses Wold of doing this to limit the amount of compensation he would be able to provide if the lawsuit were settled. 

READ MORE: 1 year since the Davenport collapse: Here's where legal proceedings stand

The Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation (DCI) was requested to help investigate the collapse at 324 Main St. in the days following the tragic event. Its investigation wasn't announced until mid-July of last year. Iowa DCI confirmed with News 8 that they have completed their report. It now heads to the Scott County Attorney's Office, which will determine whether or not to file any criminal charges. No other updates in the criminal investigation have been made available. 

News 8's Jon Diaz spoke with Iowa State Rep. Monica Kurth, D-Scott County, in early May about what can be done in an event like the collapse. Kurth says there is a connection between legislation made at a statewide level and its impact on county and municipality laws, specifically building codes. 

"I have not been able to ferret it out yet," Kurth said. "But one of the things that we can do and have done is declare a disaster and bring in disaster assistance...We could do that in a faster, quicker way. Certainly, that's a need."

Two bills that passed this previous session are focused on just that. Kurth says she was on subcommittees for both. 

The first one, HF2167, would raise the amount of individual disaster assistance from $5,000 to $7,000 for those who make less than 200% of the poverty line. It was signed into law by Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds on May 17. Another bill, HF2308, was signed into law in April and concerns how the state can respond when a federal disaster declaration is made. Kurth said the law sets the amount the state can quickly provide in the event of a disaster. 

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News 8 has spent months compiling never-before-seen footage as part of its special report "A Community Rising: Davenport Collapse 1 Year Later." It would not have been made possible without the hard work and determination of the following WQAD employees: Josh Lamberty, Jon Diaz, Joe McCoy, Jenna Webster, Jonathan Fong, Cesar Sanchez, Shelby Kluver, Scott Weas, Charles Hart, Mikaela Schlueter, Alec Doxsee, Jenny Hipskind, Andy McKay and Corey Spencer.

Find continuing coverage of the Davenport collapse on News 8's YouTube page