First the Pershing Park case. The Office of the Attorney General may have had serious trouble with another high profile lawsuit---the Georgetown Library fire case. In April 2007, a three-alarm fire gutted Georgetown's public library. Two hundred firefighters along with roughly two dozen trucks battled the blaze. That huge effort may not have translated into a thorough investigation into the fire's cause. Chief Dennis Rubin and Co.'s sloppy detective work may cost the city big time.

In a lawsuit stemming from the fire, a contractor has challenged the department's conclusions that heat guns caused the blaze. The contractor saw enough holes in the fire department's investigation to sue the District.  Whether heat guns caused the blaze or not, the lawsuit is making one thing clear: the OAG is having difficulties furnishing evidence and discovery materials.

And OAG lawyers are furious at fire department personnel.

If there ever was a fire that called out for a serious investigation, it would be the twin fires that gutted the library and Eastern Market. The Eastern Market fire continues to be a subject of debate. Apparently, according to e-mails obtained by City Desk, the Georgetown Library fire investigation was far from competent.

At one point, an OAG attorney calls into question whether fire investigators followed national standards, and whether those investigators should be punished.

On February 19, 2009, Assistant Attorney General Esther Yong e-mails two fire officials---then-Assistant Fire Marshal Bruce Faust and Lt. Craig Duck. She writes:

"Based on some of the deposition testimony, there are additional documents, photos, and information that we need from FEMS regarding the Georgetown Library fire investigation.

First, I understand from my conversation with Lt. Duck today that each fire investigator has a notebook in which he keeps notes relating to his fire investigation work. We need copies of all pages from all fire investigator notebooks that relate to the Georgetown Library fire.

Second, Firefighter Ford testified in his deposition today that he took a whole photolog of pictures that were not included in the Fire Marshal's report. Firefighter Ford testified that he did not remember to whom he gave the photos, but (presumably) he did give them to someone in FEMS. I understand from my conversation with Lt. Duck today that firefighter Ford should have created a photo log for those pictures and provided them on CD to Lt. Duck, but it appears that he did not do so."

Yong goes on to implore Faust and Co. to find those pictures. And yet, discovery issues continued to be a problem. Yong didn't return a call for comment before this story's deadline.

On April 6, 2009, OAG attorney Michael Stern e-mailed Faust, Duck and other department personnel concerning discovery problems. Stern wasn't happy with the department's foot dragging.

Stern wrote:

"This is a 13+million dollar law suit. Enough for DC to hire many firefighters, or lawyers for that matter (or avoid layoffs or furloughs). Is there nothing that can be done to get this information? The first e-mail request in this chain was sent mid-February. (Though the original discovery requests to FEMS were sent maybe as long as a year before that time). We are now facing two motions for sanctions for not providing discovery. If granted the sanctions could limit our ability to present information. We need more urgency in getting these responses than we have had so far."

Stern then zeroed in on the question of whether or not the fire investigators kept notes on their work. He wrote:

"On a related issue, we've sent many emails requesting investigator notes. We've gotten back replies that they do not exist. However, the national standards for fire investigation require all investigators on the scene document their observations with notes and diagrams. If indeed there are no notes or diagrams, both for the purpose of trial preparation and to respond to the motions for sanctions, can the investigators explain why they did not follow the national standards? Is it that they weren't trained on these standards, or they forgot, etc.? Also is there some process FEMS initiates regarding review processes and personal evaluations when they learn trained investigators do not follow national standards of care in investigating cases, or when FEMS does not get responses from their employees to the questions raised by supervisors in attempting to obtain discovery information for lawsuits?"

Stall Tactics

Stern's e-mails followed a motion filed by the plaintiffs compelling discovery responses from the District. In their 16-page missive, the lawyers more than suggest the District was stonewalling in turning over fire documents:

"The District is represented by the Office of the Attorney General, which has the responsibility to search each agency, division and department's records for responsive information. The District has not provided full and complete answers to the discovery in this case despite numerous extensions, and therefore this motion is necessary."

Discovery began in Sept. 2008, the lawyers write. The OAG responded by requesting one extension after another. According to their motion, the lawyers wrote the District on December 29, 2008 and asked for the promised documents; the response back was less than promising:

"The District responded that the majority of the documents that the District has were already produced (which was confusing because the District had produced very little documentation)."

On January 8, the District promised to send over two CDs worth of documents. But once the documents were turned over, plaintiffs lawyers argue that "it was apparent that the District's production was incomplete and superficial. [Plaintiffs were], to be blunt, shocked by the inadequacy of the District's effort after all the extensions up to that point."

The lawyers then raised a point that has been highlighted in the Pershing Park matter---the OAG's lack of control over the case. They write:

"The District was sending different lawyers to the various depositions, there seemed to be no central person responsible for tracking down the number of files that the District's witnesses were identifying during the course of their depositions and which had not been produced."

By mid-February, plaintiffs lawyers had begun deposing fire investigators. They write that "it was becoming apparent that the District had not obtained those complete files either, including investigator's notes and electronic data that Lt. Duck has recently confirmed would not have been included in the case jacket."

It gets worse. The lawyers write:

"After it became clear during the fire investigator depositions that the District's origin and cause investigation was mishandled, the District's promise of production were becoming suspect...There had not seemed to be a sense of urgency on the District's part to produce its files despite multiple promises and extensions."

Finally, six months after the discovery requests were made, the District sent over the much promised documents in early March. Still, this production fell well short, the lawyers contend:

"When the District's documents did arrive, it was readily apparent that the response was again incomplete. Many of the documents that the District produced were documents that the District had simple recopied from its prior production, or it simply recopied prior agency FOIA responses, although FOIA responses are considerably more limited than the discovery that the parties are entitled to in litigation."

Plaintiffs lawyers go on to describe how serious time and money have been wasted. Incomplete depositions have been taken. District witnesses have shown up without their own files.  Among the missing documents still outstanding: photographs of the fire scene, "the complete fire investigation file," "fire investigation protocols," investigator notes and electronic files, the fire investigators'  internal communications, and the investigators' external communications with D.C. Police, the ATF or any other outside agency.

One source says that he turned over his notes to his fire department superiors. It was only after he was approached by an OAG lawyer did he realize his notes had not be turned over in this case.

The source says that the stonewalling may have had to do with who was leading the library fire investigation: Lt. Duck.

"Duck had no training in fire investigation. He definitely wasn’t a certified fire investigator. He had no training in interviewing and interrogation. And he had already had started to interview people on the scene prior to my arrival," the source says. "[Duck] clearly just copied or cut and pasted ATF’s report making a few changes to see that it looked like his. He threw away valuable evidence. He threw away items---the debris from the roof which is where the fire started."

The source adds that Duck did not properly secure evidence that he actually held on to. The heat guns were kept in the investigative unit untagged.

The sloppy investigation may have inevitably led to a mishandling of a court case any fire department official should have seen coming. "Here we go once again, the fire department was not prepared with these situations," the source says. "These cases always come up."

He calls the department's handling of the fire and the subsequent investigation and lawsuit: "unprofessional, uncaring and basically ignorant."

"Now, they’re caught with their pants down," the source says.

"It was a botched investigation," says another source close to the case. "A lot of the documents never existed because the proper investigative steps were not taken at the Georgetown Library scene. When this happens, the fire department, instead of admitting their mistakes and making the necessary changes inside of the agency, they just cover it up....Clearly, it doesn't seem to be a priority in the fire department or the attorney general's office to correct these problems. It's just a continuation of the pattern of corruption and cover up in investigations."

OAG lawyer Stern refused to comment for this story. Plaintiffs attorneys also refused to comment.

When asked if the investigators' notes and photographs had been turned over, Lt. Duck told City Desk: "I have no idea."

Duck then referred all calls to the department's public information office. Fire officials refused to allow Faust to be interviewed for this story.

"We can not discuss the case because right now it's in litigation," explains Deputy Chief Kenneth Crosswhite.

AG Peter Nickles had an equally succinct reponse to this story. “I don’t think I can help you on that," he says. "It’s not on the top of my radar.”

*photo by Darrow Montgomery.

The D.C. Council saw one of the livelier proceedings in recent memory this morning, when Peaceoholics co-founder Ronald Moten appeared before councilmembers Mary Cheh and Phil Mendelson in connection with their investigation into the donation of used city emergency equipment to the Dominican Republic.

The proceeding wasn't hearing, exactly, but an open deposition. Moten had originally been scheduled to give his deposition behind closed doors on Friday, but he declined to testify, citing the council's political motivations. Council staff agreed to let him say his piece in public today, in what Mendelson called a "very unusual" proceeding.

Moten set the tone early, with a combative opening statement decrying a "political smear campaign" targeting his organization. He accused councilmembers and media of "attacking the mayor at my organization's expense" and engaging in a "political charade" that has affected his business and his family. "We hold the council directly responsible for creating an atmosphere where such stories could flourish," he said of media accounts questioning his organization's role in the shadowy transfer. The questions will remain, he says, until the "thirst for political blood is quenched."

Cheh and Mendelson reacted not at all to Moten's grandstanding. Once their questioning began, some vital facts quickly emerged: It became clear that Peaceoholics, far from being at the center of the giveaway, was something of a bit player. Moten, in his testimony, made it clear that this was a production of David Jannarone, the mayoral director of development, and Sinclair Skinner, an longtime Fenty crony now a businessman and consultant.

It was they, Skinner in particular, who first approached Moten about the donating the fire truck, earlier this year. And it was a company associated with Skinner---Liberty Industries LLC---who provided the funds to transport the fire truck and ambulance down to the Caribbean. Moten described Jannarone an acquaintance, while he said he'd known Skinner "for years" through their activist work.

"We agreed that I would join them on a good deed," he said.

Moten said he'd never been to Sosua, the town that was to get the equipment. He'd only been to the Dominican Republic in 1989, as a teenager, and he confirmed that he doesn't currently hold a passport.

Then Cheh tried to get Moten to describe his relationship with the District government, in particular the nature of his contracts. That set Moten off again: 'Cheh...what you're trying to do is tear down my organization," he cried. "What I think you're doing is criminal."

Moten went on to describe brief contacts regarding procedural matters with Robin Booth, an official in the Office of Contracting and Procurement, and Ronald Gill, a deputy fire chief. (Both were deposed Friday.) Moten went on to describe how the shipping on the ambulance and fire truck---an $11,000 proposition---was paid for. He received a check, drawn on Liberty Industries, from Skinner; Peaceoholics turned around and used those funds to pay a shipping company.

Then Cheh turned to the aftermath, in particular Attorney General Peter Nickles' (non-)investigation which declared the whole enterprise legal and proper without mentioning the involvement of prime movers Jannarone and Skinner. When Cheh started asking Moten about that investigation, he took the opportunity to embark on more speechifying: 'The whole thing was to make the mayor look bad; that's how the whole thing was set up," he said. "You were on TV 20 times talking about the situation, making it bigger than it is....I know everybody's running [for office] and they have to do what they have to do."

That speech won him cheers from about 40 allies in the audience, before Cheh admonished them to be quiet.

Moten continued protesting his alleged victimization: "You all let that happen!" he told Cheh. "You and Phil let that happen!" (As an aside, he referred to Cheh as "Cheh" for most of the hearing.)

Then Cheh turned to the subject of William Walker III, the man who birthed the idea of donating a fire truck to Sosua. Moten gave an account of his involvement that matches the account given by Walker himself, as printed in LL's column this week---that he randomly encountered Walker outside an Anacostia restaurant in March, and let slip that he was donating equipment to the DR. That flabbergasted Walker, who had earlier tried to consummate such a deal.

Moten said that he and Walker talked after that about getting Walker's organization, and kids he mentored, into the deal---in what would culminate in a big trip down to Sosua with all the interested parties. (Walker was scheduled to testify on the matter in a hearing today, but begged off due to sickness.)

Then the shit hit the fan. The story turned up in the paper, Nickles ordered the firetrucks turned around, and the whole thing has turned into a mess.

Then, an hour into the deposition, Mendelson started his questioning, and that's when things got especially combative. Moten, under the advice of his attorney, Rodney Mitchell, refused to answer questions that had been previously been asked. "You're acting like you're a prosecutor, I'm a criminal," he said at one point. "We're not gonna answer the same questions over and over again." He used that excuse repeatedly over the course of the next 45 minutes, under questioning from Mendelson and Cheh's chief of staff. Repeatedly Moten tried to invoke his constitutional right against criminal self-incrimination: "Fifth! Fifth!" he'd shout, despite his protestations about not being involved in criminal activity. (At one point, Cheh said after the hearing, she heard Mitchell instructing Moten to say he "didn't recall" answers to certain questions.)

At another point, Moten referred to a "political assassination at my expense" and told Mendelson, as he tried to confirm a timeline, "Right now my mind is not listening to you...because you're asking the same question....I think I deserve more respect than that, Phil."

But for the most part, the questions got answered.

And the picture those answers paint looks a lot like the one painted by Walker: That this production was hijacked from Walker by Skinner and Jannarone, and that those two used Moten and Peaceoholics simply as a nonprofit pass-through to comply with city surplussing regulations. If Moten was indeed a "pawn," as Walker describes him, nothing in Moten's testimony today disputes that characterization.

As to why Skinner and Jannarone would pursue such a giveaway, answers will have to come from them. After the hearing, Cheh says she expects to issue subpoenas for their testimony shortly.

Like Walker, Moten says he still wants to donate that equipment: "In hindsight, if we would have had to do it all over again, we would have slowed it down and had a press conference."

You've read about them all week in the pages of the Examiner and lesser publications! Now see them with your own eyes---the fire truck and ambulance once donated by the District government, controversially, to the Dominican Republic!

A well-tipped LL, accompanied by ace photog Darrow Montgomery, headed down in the LLmobile to the city property yard and warehouse on Adams Street NE this afternoon. Behind the warehouse, they found the two vehicles, a 1998 Seagrave pumper and a 2002 Ford E-450 ambulance, sitting comfortably behind traffic cones.

Both had affixed to their windshields labels from shipping concern Seaboard Marine. According to the shipper's Web site, it costs anywhere from $1,500 to $4,100 a piece to ship such machinery from Miami to Puerto Plata, DR, depending on its length.

Photos by Darrow Montgomery

The investigative piece, which puts to shame even the windiest of City Paper cover stories on the word-count front, delves into the decadeslong dysfunction in the agency. The basic message is that the people responsible for your well-being if you suffer a stroke, heart attack, or some other calamity are demoralized, underpaid, and poorly regarded by their firefighting peers in this agency.

One of the story's strongest points is its accountability moment for Mayor Adrian M. Fenty, who in his 2006 campaign promised to separate out the emergency medical part of the agency from its firefighting component. Here's the mag's treatment of that question:

Since taking office in January 2007, Fenty not only has reneged on his campaign promise, but he hired as fire chief Dennis Rubin, a DC native adamant about keeping EMS within the fire department. Rubin said at his confirmation hearing that if EMS were separated from fire, he would refuse the job and return to Atlanta, where he was fire chief.

Fenty has never explained his reversal. E-mail and telephone requests to his office asking why he broke his campaign promise to separate EMS from the fire department have gone unanswered. Some observers suggest that the firefighters union pressured him; others think he backed off because he realized it would be too politically difficult. He also might have realized that separating EMS from fire likely would mean closing firehouses, triggering fierce opposition from the firefighters union and its supporters in Congress. Civilian EMS personnel remain bitterly disappointed by Fenty’s broken promise.

“No one wants to touch the EMS-separation issue,” says one former city official. “It’s a hot potato with a lot of politics involved.”