Demolition contractors at the former Deutsche Bank building “gambled with lives for money” by ignoring safety problems at the site – and it was hero firefighters Robert Beddia and Joseph Graffagnino who paid the price for their roll of the dice, a prosecutor said today.

Salvatore DePaola, Mitchel Alvo and Jeffrey Melofchik all had decades of experience in construction, demolition and abatement work, and all should have known that dismantling the building’s standpipe would turn it in to a “deathtrap,” prosecutor Brian Fields said in opening statements.

“They knew the standpipe” – the piping that firefighters can tap into to battle blazes on high floors of skyscrapers – “was breached,” Fields said, “and they disregarded the risk.”

So when Beddia, 53, and married father of two Graffagnino, 33, were on the building’s 14th floor to try to put out a cigarette-sparked blaze that should have been easily containable, they were instead overcome with thick smoke in a fire that quickly raged out of control.

Both died at the scene – and Fields said it could have been worse.

“Over 100 firefighters were stranded in the Deutsche Bank building because they had no water. A controllable fire became uncontrollable,” he said.

Now DePaola, Alvo, and Melofchik are all standing trial for manslaughter and criminally negligent homicide. They face up to 25 years in prison if convicted. DePaola and Alvo’s employer, John Galt Co., is also charged in the case and faces fines and other sanctions if convicted.

Fields said all three men had a duty to keep the site safe, and “knew or should have known” that the standpipe was dismantled and unusable, because of warnings from workers and city violations. They also knew there was plenty of risk of fire, with workers using torches to take the 9/11 scarred building apart, and ignoring city building codes forbidding smoking at the site.

“Smoking and drinking was everywhere,” Fields said.

Instead of taking action, the bosses looked the other way because they were desperate to get the $58 million job done as quickly as possible to avoid financial penalties, Fields said.

Defense openings are expected tomorrow. Lawyers for the trio maintain bungling by goverment agencies that were supposed to monitor the project should bear the brunt of the blame for the deadly blaze.