The Los Angeles Fire Department, which is responsible for preventing wildfires, had faced allegations of corruption, laziness, harassment and discrimination for years before the wildfires that devastated the city.
This is just another stain on the Los Angeles Fire Department. They include allegations that a deputy police officer drank alcohol while supervising the 2021 wildfires in the Pacific Palisades, the very same area where the most destructive blaze in Los Angeles history occurred this month.
The firefighter was later cleared of wrongdoing by the fire department and awarded a $1.4 million payout.
The LAFD Fire Department is responsible for inspecting buildings and taking steps such as clearing brush before a fire starts.
But the department has a long history of fake inspections, lax enforcement, incompetent and untrained new hires, and severe retaliation against those who speak out, according to a lawsuit that was settled in 2022. has been done.
a 2015 LA Times Investigation Thousands of high-rise apartment buildings, schools, churches and other buildings were found not to have been inspected for years.
following year, CBS2 An inspector who conducted fake “ghost inspections” of already closed elementary schools and daycare centers has been arrested.
It fired LAFD Fire Department Chief John Vidovich, only to slam his former employer with a retaliation lawsuit, claiming he was fired for exposing a top-down culture of fraud and cut corners. According to the Times.
The city ultimately settled the lawsuit for $800,000.
A lawsuit filed in 2017 by six fire inspectors alleges that the department, facing public backlash and overwhelmed with years of backlogs, has filled its staff with incompetent, untrained newcomers. They say he forced them to perform sloppy and incomplete tests.
Employees claimed that when they spoke out about sloppy inspections, they were branded “inside terrorists” and denied promotions and important assignments.
The plaintiffs, who are Black, also alleged a long-standing culture of racism and sexism against the department by the regional fire department.
The force's black and female firefighters were “stigmatized by others within LAFD as being lazy and afraid of fighting fires, and that's why they go to FPB.”
The city paid the plaintiffs a $3 million settlement in 2022.
But when it comes to racism and sexism, the allegations go beyond a single station.
In 2021, Black, Latinx, and female police officers faced no punishment after Deputy Chief Fred Mathis, a white male deputy, allegedly drank alcohol on duty during a Pacific Palisades wildfire. Leaders of three firefighter organizations voiced their condemnation. The LA Times reported.
After a seven-month investigation, the department concluded that he was not technically on duty because he was intoxicated and unwell.
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Mattis told the Times he had done nothing wrong and that he struggled with alcoholism at the time, but that it never interfered with his work.
The department handed him a $1.4 million payout to settle the matter, but the organization claimed that would never have happened to a minority or female employee in his rank.
In the same year, a black female arson investigator sued the department for discrimination, and in 2024, a former firefighter filed a lawsuit alleging homophobic harassment. According to the LA Times.
In 2022, Chief Ralph Terrazas resigned amid allegations of widespread sexism and abuse against female firefighters, and one of his deputy chiefs was relieved of his duties amid a sexual harassment investigation. The same outlet also reported.
He was succeeded by Fire Chief Christine Crowley, the department's first female and openly gay person.
LAFD did not immediately respond to a request for comment when asked what the new chief has done in recent years to dispel allegations of toxicity within the department.
