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NJ Firefighter Accused of Sexual Misconduct Loses Appeal for Pre-Trial Intervention
A New Jersey volunteer firefighter accused of engaging in sexual improprieties with a teenage female member of his department has lost his appeal to be admitted into a pre-trial intervention program that would have allowed him to escape responsibility without a criminal record.
Joseph Dlabik was charged with official misconduct, luring and endangering the welfare of a child. The allegations arouse out of conduct that occurred between January and March of 2014 at the Lawrence Road Fire Company. Dlabik reportedly:
- texted the teenager to meet him at the station
- lured her to a secluded area at the firehouse
- asked her training questions and required her to remove a piece of clothing each time she got a question wrong
- showed her obscene material on his cell phone
Prosecutors have offered Dlabik a plea deal of five years in state prison, but that offer has been rejected. More on the story.
Well, unlike the firefighter in the Indiana issue, apparently there are rules that will prevent him from remaining a firefighter in the future after his conviction.
What was he thinking? If it he were with a woman over the age of 18, did the same stupid things, he’d still get thrown out of his VFC for his actions.
Neither one should be firefighters, but as I wrote about the one in Indiana, at least he has kept his record clear over the years and now the rules seem to be changing after the fact in his case.
That has happened a couple of times out here in California, where people were “Grandfathered” in to remain in their current jobs ( EMS workers and Calif. Conservation Corps members form the 1970’s early 1980’s) despite their past criminal or other job classification cases to keep them long term, because they have kept their record clear or they were good long term employees.
How is it that so many firefighters thinking engaging in sexual shenanigans of ANY sort with a female department member — ESPECIALLY A MINOR — is in any way acceptable?!?
Geez, guys, ask yourself this one question when these really “wonderful” ideas pop into your little pea-brains: “How would my wife take this?” If she wouldn’t be happy, then DON’T FREAKING DO IT, YOU IDIOTS!