HIALEAH – Hialeah police released photos Wednesday that show the shoddy electrical work that led to three children being shocked in a community pool last week.
Police took dozens of pictures of the pool equipment after the April 27 incident at the Palms West condominiums on West 56th Street.
One of the images shows a disconnected green ground wire on the pool pump.
According to the Hialeah building inspectors' report, when the pump malfunctioned the electricity to it wasn't directed into the ground. Instead, it energized the water the pump was pushing back into the pool.
"I was in the pool and then the metal railing, I was swimming close to it, and I felt a shock," said Diego Cabrera, one of three children injured in the pool.
The victims spent several nights in the hospital. The pool has been closed since the incident and the pump room is "red tagged" by the city as an unsafe building.
The police pictures back up the inspector's report, which said several pieces of pool and lighting equipment were incorrectly wired, suffered from severe corrosion or damage, or were improperly spliced. What's more, the shoddy work should have been caught by the city's electrical inspector, except the city didn't know the work had been done. That's because the property owner never pulled a permit.
It's still unclear who ordered the electrical work without a permit, but it's likely the property owner will ultimately be cited for code violations and face a monetary fine.