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Fired Denver schoolteacher charged in lab fire

DENVER (AP) — A Denver school chemistry teacher who was fired after four students were burned in a science experiment gone wrong now faces a criminal charge.

Prosecutors filed a third-degree assault charge, a misdemeanor, against 22-year-old Daniel Powell on Wednesday. Powell couldn’t be located for comment.

School officials say a fire erupted in Powell’s classroom at the Science, Math and Arts Academy charter school on Sept. 15 while he was conducting a demonstration with methanol.

It marked the second time in a month that a fire linked to methanol in a science demonstration caused injuries. Thirteen people, many of them children, were hurt in a flash fire at a Reno, Nevada, museum on Sept. 3.

The Denver school said this month that three students are back in class and the fourth student continues to improve.

Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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