The little unincorporated area where i live has a volunteer fire department. Five of those firefighters and two others have been charged with arson. This started with a string of brush fires a few months ago, This will boggle your mind....recently several structural fires and brush fires were purposely set by these people...the reason you ask? so they could rush to the fires in their new fire truck.... what got them caught? two weeks ago they asked a land owner, if they could set fire to an old house on the property for practice. He told them no, and a few days later they set it on fire anyway. when the land owner complained to the sheriffs office, the 911 tapes were checked, the call came from one of the firefighters cell phone. researching it further, they found that all of the recent fires were called in by firefighters. Up until this point...this was reported by Walb news in Albany Ga.


The new fire truck was bought by the county, what happened to the old one? It was called to a brush fire, where it ran out of gas, they all pile in a volunteers truck to go get gas...the fire truck burned. That call also, was phoned in by a firefighter.

What is so far unsubstantiated, is this...
according to locals, there is also an investigation into an insurance scam.

This equates, (imo) to a team of doctors poisoning a patient for money. Whats sad, is i know some of these people, I can't believe they did this, but they have admitted to setting the fires.

Mark That is crazy!!!!

what makes this even scarier, is at the time they began setting all the brush fires, we were in a drought, earlier last year, in similar conditions a fire was started in the Okefenokee state park about seventy miles away from here, the fire consumed over 400,000 acres of land from south Ga to Fla.

oops....and hi Barb

This world is indeed going whacko!People in general are the scariest when they pull things like that!
Dont know about you,but I am ashamed to be a part of the human race.There is too much greed,too much hate,too much prejudice,crimes against others and nature.
We are going to be our own doingin!We will destroy ourselves someday,all over insanity!!

corruption in civil servants???........unbelievable....NOT!This has happened before.Nice read,though.

that is so tragic...

especially in drought conditions...

i have heard from one man who was a firefighter,
and he said they would wait around until grass
and brush fires get out of control so badly
before starting to put them out,
for job security
& to keep the government funding way up

the irony is that greed, hate, prejudice, etc. comes from our animal sides..... these are actually all animal instincts. However, that doen't make our behavior less revolting.

that's why we need to get in touch

with our spiritual side

Hummm guess they wanted the practice bad.


Actually several years ago there was and house next door to me that was condemed but could not get the city to do anything about it. Noticed the Fire Department was holding there little classes in in guess to get practice in old buildings. Finally I went in front of the City Meeting to plead my case. Of course the Mayor was trying to tell me she had no ideal how to get a hold of the land owner. Yeah right ya know that is full of it not that hard to find out who owns what. So I preceded to tell the Mayor in front of the City Lawyer and others listening what the Fire Department was doing and was that not a law suit if it had not been okayed by the home owner. Hummm sure funny all of a sudden they knew who owned the house. Which just a few weeks afterwards the house was leveled.

But....... in this case the Fire Department did have the okay to do what they were doing but.. was leaving the property not locked up windows were not boarded up very unsafe to be around. But in the long run I got my way. The City Lawyer seemed to have told the Mayor they better comply and level the house or else I could bring a law suit against the City for leaving a house Condemned for as long as they did.

by the community with fighting them. The incidence of malicious firesetting by firefighters is invariably portrayed in the literature as quite rare, although direct research is limited. The NSW police service's Strikeforce Tronto investigated some 1,500 suspicious fires from 2001 to 2004. It resulted in 50 people being charged, 11 of them volunteer firefighters. To keep this in perspective, the 11 firefighters were from a population of 69,000 NSW Rural Fire Service members.

Despite the small number of incidents, the impact of firefighter arson can go well beyond the damage caused by the fire itself. The community relies on and trusts its fire services, and the lighting of fires by members of those services can undermine public confidence, particularly given the accompanying media attention. This can affect community support in very direct ways, such as funding of rural fire services. The fire service could suffer loss of morale or have its effectiveness compromised by the disruption of allegations and investigations. Damage to the fire service's reputation could interfere with its ability to attract high quality recruits.

When a firefighter turns arsonist, it will usually be out of a desire for excitement or as a way of gaining attention and recognition. A firefighter craving stimulation or activity may start a fire before reporting for duty. There are cases of firefighters who have started a fire, reported it and attended the fire with their unit in the hope of being seen as the hero who saves the community. In other cases the motive may be to gain self-esteem through a demonstration of power and control. Some fires may be lit by aggrieved firefighters who feel they have been treated badly in some way by their organisation or community. There will also be a few who start fires for profit, such as those seeking overtime payments or those paid on a piece-basis when they attend fires.

The USFA (2003), in its special report on firefighter arson, has suggested the need for proactive prevention and awareness programs to instil in new recruits and experienced members a zero-tolerance approach to firesetting behaviour. The keys to prevention, the USFA suggests, lie in recognising the problem, acknowledging the threat it poses to public safety and the credibility of the fire service, and implementing screening procedures for new recruits.

There are difficulties with screening, particularly for volunteer services, that remain to be fully investigated. Many Australian fire services have made positive steps by introducing criminal records checks for new members, and by acknowledging at all levels of the organisation that firefighter arson does occur. By bringing into the open a problem that was once hidden, the chances of reducing the incidence of this behaviour are greatly improved.

Submitted by CyPoet

this sounds like a re-enactment

of the sick "munchhausens's disease"

only for firefighters

But regardless I still hold a very high repect for the Fire Fighters there are sooooo many more good that out way the bad.

Lindyy says:

WELL, Mark, what can I say? May I ask the REAL intent of your post?

You all know that my son is a VOLUNTEER FIREMAN.

So, may I pose the question to you again? What is the REAL intent of your thread?

Be my guest, please, and bash all firemen throughout the United States. They are such horrible creatures, you know.

But, Mark, mark my words, YOU will be the first one screaming your head off if they do not show up quick enough to suit YOUR demands.

Oh, and you say it is a VOLUNTEER firedepartment. HOW MUCH DO YOU, MARK, DONATE TO THE VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT???

A very cheap shot at the people that risk their lives to save others. Very cheap.

Lindyy


OH, P.S. where is your proof of all of this so I may read?

Hummm he is not putting the Volunteer Fire Department down he is stating a fact that was in the news.

In every aspect of life from Lawyers to Firmen ect there are a few bad eggs in the bunch.

My daughter's B/F is not a Volunteer he is the full fledge thing but regardless there are bad within every good.

It is sad to see it happen but it does.


I very seriously doubt Mark's post had anything to do with your son being a fireman since Mark and I had talked about this a few days ago and he was going to post it. I myself had no ideal your son was a Volunteer Fire Fighter as you did not know my daughters B/F was a Fire Man. Even so I do not have a problem with this post. It is life and happens but..... it does not in anyway change my thoughts about Firemen they are still high on my ladder of respect.

Oh, my son is not a 'full fledged'? MY DEAR, MY SON RISKS HIS LIFE EVERY TIME HE GOES ON A CALL, AND GETS PAID NOTHING, NOTHING, NOTHING!!!!!!

I would just love to see the op of this face my son's fire department and throw this in their face. CHEAP.

There is a real intent behind this post. And, not a very nice one.

Lindyy

mark, it's definitely sad when things like this happen...there are bad apples in EVERY field. teachers who sleep with their students, cops who set people up, doctors who murder...

could this be what you referred to, mark?

http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/georgia/news-article.aspx?storyid=103765

http://cms.firehouse.com/content/article/article.jsp?id=58612&sectionId=46

http://www.firerescue1.com/news/387828/

Well your wrong there was no intent behind it was just something in the news.

And in no way am I saying that Volunteer does not put there life on the line for they do each time they go out. But they will even tell you there are good and bad in every field. It is a shame that it is that way but it does happen.

Oh most definitely ...I agree totally

I applaud the people who do put their lives in harms way for all of us, this thread had no ill intent, only to make the public aware that these things do happen, I do not see where i have suggested any malcontent towards anyone.

go team america