Boston Fire Chief Threatens to Sue His Deputy Chiefs
Boston Fire Chief Steve E. Abraira has threatened to file suit against the 13 deputy chiefs who criticized him in a letter to Mayor Thomas M. Menino following the Boston Marathon bombing.
The threats were contained in a letter was sent last week by Attorney Louis M. Ciavarra to the deputies. Among the quoted parts of the letter:
- “Your conduct is nothing more than a transparent effort to hide the inadequacies of your own performance and to interfere with my client’s efforts to improve the Boston Fire Department”
- The “timing of your letter, and in particular linking it to the tragedy of April 15th, is reprehensible”
- It “was a misplaced and frankly outrageous attack intended to strengthen your ability to reject and obstruct Chief Abraira’s efforts to bring the BFD in line with modern fire fighting practices.”
Ciavarra’s letter characterized the letter sent by the deputy chiefs to Mayor Menino on April 26, 2013 as defamatory and threatened to file suit “should any further such conduct occur.”
The letter sparked a strong rebuke by the attorney for the deputy chiefs, Joseph G. Donnellan, who today characterized Ciavarra’s letter as an effort to prevent them from testifying at a Boston City Council hearing scheduled for June 18, 2013.
According to Donnellan, “Each and every one of them saw it that way… They saw it as a direct attempt to make sure [the deputy chiefs] don’t go to that hearing and don’t speak their mind.”
Donnellan issued a threat of his own: “Most assuredly, if the chief’s lawyer follows through on his threat to sue the deputy chiefs of the Boston Fire Department, we will react very strongly and very swiftly.”
Note: If any of my friends from Boston can supply a copy of the letters, I’d be much obliged.
If Chief Abraira does sue his Deputy Chief's, How would he expect to effectively lead the department when he and his immediately suborniates are sueing each other? Would they hold weekly command staff meetiings / Depositions?
Kevin
The entire situation is troubling. When you have to threaten to sue coworkers… well… the trolley is off the track as my Boston law professors used to say….
There was another case in 2005 in San Francisco where firefighters (including 2 assistant chiefs and 7 BCs) sued their fire chief to get her to enforce a "no drinking on duty" policy.
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/SAN-FRANCISCO-Fire-Dept-sued-over-alcohol-2691520.php
I think every chief should have his or her own lawyer, and since I'll be in Boston next week….
Counsellor Comstock
That is little more than shameless self-promotion… It is reprehensible… given that I live in Boston's back yard… and mere 60 miles away… I could be in Boston in roughly an hour….
If problems exist in the Command and Control of the Boston FD and the Deputy Chief's are aware of it and expose it, the Chief's lawsuit seems to be an intimitation tactic to keep them quiet.
Rather the Chief should be meeting with them to find out what they are seeing and taking steps to correct the situation.
Has he forgotten this?
That is after all what modern mangement Style is about;
Identify the Problem and develop alternatives to find a solution and finally chose the best and implement it.
in reply to Ukfbbuff comments
“modern management style” would require the deputies to practice what they preach. They are accountable to have identified the problem and validate solutions. Where is their remedy effort? Is this a final act of defiance? I’m not privy to the inside operations of the BFD, but; something appears to be amiss w/the way and timing of which this was handled