Posts Tagged FireLawBlog.com

Family sues fire departments for wrongful death

Excerpts from the firelawblog.com:

The family of a man who died in a fire last year has filed suit against twenty-one Illinois fire departments and two chief officers claiming they failed to effect his rescue. Aric Evan Tashjian McClure died on August 4, 2017 in a fire that trapped him in a second floor apartment in Round Lake, Illinois. He was 33 years old.

Firefighters responded to the scene just before 5 p.m. and the fire was extinguished by about 8:30 p.m. However, because the building was considered too dangerous to enter, McClure’s body was not recovered until the following morning.

McClure’s estate filed the 140-page 52-count complaint in Lake County Circuit Court on August 2, 2018, just before the one year anniversary of the fire. Named in the suit as defendants are twenty-one fire departments, MABAS Division 4, Fire Chief Greg Formica and Fire Marshal Tony Breuscher of the Greater Round Lake Fire Protection District, the building’s owner Scott Gothann, and Gothann’s son-in-law, Matthew Sheppard. Gothann and Sheppard were reportedly making plumbing repairs to the building when the fire broke out.

Here are the twenty-one departments:

  1. Greater Round Lake Fire Protection District
  2. Antioch Fire Department
  3. Highland Park Fire Department
  4. Lincolnshire-Riverwoods Fire Department
  5. Town of Salem Fire/Rescue
  6. Buffalo Grove Fire Department
  7. Countryside Fire Protection District
  8. Libertyville Fire Department
  9. Grayslake Fire Protection District
  10. Barrington Countryside Fire Protection District
  11. Gurnee Fire Department
  12. Lake Forest Fire Department
  13. Lake Villa Fire Protection District
  14. Lake Zurich Fire and Rescue Department
  15. Mundelein Fire Department
  16. Newport Fire Protection District
  17. Wauconda Fire Protection District
  18. Waukegan Fire Department
  19. McHenry Township Fire Protection District
  20. Nunda Rural Fire Protection District,
  21. Spring Grove Fire Protection District

The suit alleges wrongful death and negligence. Quoting from the complaint:

  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, with knowledge that Plaintiff’s decedent, Aric Evan Tashjian McClure, had not been located and might still be in the burning Subject Building, this defendant failed to assess and investigate the area of the Subject Building where Plaintiff’s decedent, Aric Evan Tashjian McClure, would most likely be located and was last seen, which was his second-story apartment;
  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, this Defendant consciously disregarded the numerous and repeated statements by neighbors, from the decedent’s mother, Beatrice Charmian Tashjian, and other witnesses, that Plaintiff’s decedent was unaccounted for, was last seen in his apartment and believed to still be trapped in his apartment on the second-story of the Subject Building, which was on fire;
  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, and with knowledge and information that Plaintiff’s decedent was likely still located inside the burning Subject Building, this Defendant failed to perform an adequate primary search of the Subject Building, and particularly the second story apartment rented by Plaintiff’s decedent;
  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, and with knowledge and information that Plaintiff’s decedent was likely still located inside the burning Subject Building, this Defendant failed to perform a search of Plaintiff’s decedent’s second floor apartment from the exterior of the building by extending available ladders up to one or both of the second-story exterior windows, which provided direct access to the apartment occupied by Plaintiff’s decedent;
  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, and with knowledge and information the Plaintiff’s decedent was likely still located inside the burning Subject Building and specifically in his second-story apartment, this Defendant failed to search for Plaintiff’s decedent from outside the building by extending available ladders up to one or both of the exterior windows to his second-story apartment, by breaking the windows and using axle handles, pick poles and other equipment to sweep the apartment floor to search for Plaintiff’s decedent;
  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, this defendant intentionally, consciously, and recklessly completely disregarded the direct requests and pleas of Plaintiff decedent’s mother, Beatrice Charmian Tashjian, to put a ladder up to the exterior window of Aric’s second-story bedroom where Tashjian advised this Defendant and others that she had last seen Aric, and that he was taking a nap, and that she believed he was still in his bedroom, which was readily accessible from the exterior of the building by ladder at the time she requested that this Defendant search for her son from the exterior of the building; and
  • In violation of and conscious disregard for its basic training and standard operating procedures, with knowledge and information that Plaintiff’s decedent could not be located and more likely than not was still in the Subject Building, this Defendant failed to conduct a search of the entire building before leaving the scene on August 4, 2017.

The attorney for the estate, Ronald F. Wittmeyer, Jr., provided the following statement:

  • I fully support the courageous work that firefighters do, but we as citizens I believe also have a right to expect that if a building we are in catches fire, that our fire department will come and do its best to try to rescue us from the burning building, not just spray water on the fire, and then go home for the night. Aric McClure’s body was not even discovered until the next morning when the fire department returned to the scene.  And that was despite his Mother telling any firefighter who would listen during the fire the night before that she thought her son was still sleeping in his second floor apartment, where she had left him an hour earlier.

Here is a copy of the complaint: McClure v. Greater Round Lake Fire Prot District et al

Incidentally, one of the strongest defenses a fire department would have in a case like this, the public duty doctrine, was eliminated in Illinois in 2016 by what I consider to be a shortsighted decision handed down by the Illinois Supreme Court. Here is more on that decision. Note this is the second fire related suit I located this week naming an Illinois fire department as a defendant over a fire death.

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Discharged Tri-State Division Chief sues district

An article from FireLawBlog.com outlines a lawsuit filed against the Tri-State Fire Protection District by a former division chief.

A division chief with the Tri-State Fire Protection District has filed suit alleging his discharge last October was retaliation for him having filed a heart related workers comp claim and using medical leave.

Division Chief David Basek filed suit last week in federal court against the Tri-State Fire Protection District, the Tri-State Fire Protection District Board of Trustees, Hamilton Gibbons, Jill Strenzel, Michael Orrico, the Tri-State Fire Protection District Board of Commissioners, Robert Jewell, William Anderson, Christopher Baumbach, and Michelle Gibson.

The 18 page complaint alleges that Chief Basek was deprived “of his due process rights under the Constitution of the United States of America and the Constitution of the State of Illinois” because he was terminated “without providing him the predisciplinary procedures or hearing to which he is entitled”. It also alleges that Chief Basek was terminated “in retaliation for his exercise of rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act (“FMLA”) and the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Act (“IWCA”).”

Chief Basek developed a heart condition in June, 2011 and filed a workers comp claim in November, 2011. He alleges he was informed that his supervisor was “displeased” that he filed the claim and he began to be harassed. He later applied for FMLA protection. Shortly after he started FMLA leave, he was informed that an investigation was being initiated into vague and unspecified violations.

On October 29, 2012 he was called before the fire chief who informed him that following “an unspecified investigation, the unidentified rule violations had been sustained against Mr. Basek and that she was discharging him from his job as Division Chief, but offered that he could work in a union position of Career Service Lieutenant.” The discharge occurred without notice, an explanation of the charges, a hearing, or an opportunity to be heard.

The complaint includes 5 counts:

  • Count I – due process violation under federal law
  • Count II – due process violation under state law
  • Count III – mandamus request to order his reinstatement and hearing before a neutral hearing officer
  • Count IV – retaliation and discrimination under the FMLA
  • Count V – retaliatory discharge in violation of the state workers comp act

Here is a copy of the complaint.Basek v TriState

thanks Scott

 

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