It was only two days after the 2013 Salvation Army building collapse that attorney Robert Mongeluzzi faced his first dilemma in the case.

The scene at 22nd and Market streets was still a tangle of brick and splintered wooden planks. Nearly 20 people had been removed from the rubble. Six of them were dead before they could be found, and a seventh would die soon after. Those who survived were only just beginning to treat injuries that would last them a lifetime.