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Los Angeles Fire Department Chief Deputy Fred Mathis, who was investigated for misconduct, will not be punished and get to keep a $1.4 million payout he received when he retired. Last spring, the department hired a private law firm to investigate claims that Mathis was intoxicated while overseeing the operations center during the Palisades fire. He was also accused of misusing his LAFD credit card and accessing confidential records relating to his case in the LAFD's complaint tracking system.
According to the Los Angles Times, the investigation cleared Mathis of wrongdoing and said that while he may have been drunk on duty, he will not be disciplined because he retired in January within days of the investigation's conclusion. Mathis spent the last seven months of his career with the department on paid leave.
The investigation found that while it was likely that Mathis was drunk, he was considered off duty because he put in for a sick day. Previous reporting by the Times indicated that changes were made to Mathis' timekeeping records four days later to show that he took a sick day.
The investigation also cleared him of misusing the credit card, claiming that the allegations were based on the "incorrect belief that Mathis was administratively detailed home for substance abuse." The law firm also concluded that while Mathis accessed confidential records, there was no evidence he used them to influence the investigation.
Mathis sent a statement to the Times denying the allegations against him.
"All of the allegations you have presented to me are false and unsubstantiated through the investigation initiated by the department," he told the paper in an email.
"Did I make mistakes dealing with my alcoholism?" Mathis continued. "Certainly, but I don't apologize for having a disease that I continually fight every day. I never reported to duty impaired, and my work was never impacted by my addiction."
Several members of the department were not happy that Mathis wasn't punished for his actions and blamed officials for outsourcing the investigation to a private law firm.
"As soon as they gave it to a private law firm, I knew exactly what was going to happen — absolutely nothing," Battalion Chief Kris Larson said. "This goes to the overall problems in the department."