Attorneys for the city of Los Angeles moved this week to block the release of long-awaited depositions of firefighters that could provide a deeper understanding of their decisions and actions in the days leading up to the deadly Palisades fire.<\/p>\n
The attorneys representing the city in a lawsuit brought by Palisades fire victims invoked a general protective order the parties agreed to in June, which allows any side to designate all or part of any testimony in the case as confidential for up to 30 days. The parties are supposed to meet during that period to work out which parts should stay confidential, with any disagreements resolved by the judge. <\/p>\n
The Los Angeles Fire Department has faced growing scrutiny of its handling of the New Year\u2019s Eve Lachman fire ever since federal officials revealed that its embers rekindled into the Jan. 7 Palisades blaze that killed 12 people and destroyed thousands of homes. <\/p>\n
In October, The Times reported<\/a> that an LAFD battalion chief ordered firefighters to pick up their hoses from the Lachman burn scar on Jan. 2, even though crews warned that the ground was still smoldering. The LAFD also did not use thermal imaging technology<\/a> to detect underground hot spots.<\/p>\n But it is still not clear why the LAFD made those decisions. More than a year after the Palisades fire, the public has yet to hear directly from firefighters about their mop-up of the Lachman fire. The depositions of a dozen firefighters over the next two weeks \u2014 part of the lawsuit against the city and state \u2014 offer the public a rare opportunity to hear firefighters\u2019 accounts of what happened. <\/p>\n The depositions began Monday with the testimony of LAFD firefighters Cesar Garcia and Michael Contreras. Garcia and Contreras worked at Fire Station 23, one of the two stations in the Palisades, at the time of the fires. <\/p>\n As their examinations were wrapping up, attorneys representing the city said they were provisionally designating both depositions confidential under the protective order, according to Alexander \u201cTrey\u201d Robertson, who is representing fire victims. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s clear they\u2019re trying to put a blanket of silence over these firefighters\u2019 depositions,\u201d Robertson said. \u201cIt\u2019s just a delay tactic to try to keep it shielded from the public.\u201d<\/p>\n Dan Levin, an attorney representing the city, said the move gives the city time to review the testimony and determine which parts, if any, should stay confidential. <\/p>\n \u201cThe City provisionally designated deposition testimony of LAFD firefighters as confidential under the Court\u2019s protective order so that the city could review the transcripts to determine what, if any, portions of the testimony should remain confidential to protect individuals\u2019 privacy or other confidential information,\u201d Levin said. \u201cThis is a standard procedure in litigation. The plaintiffs agreed to the court order creating this procedure.\u201d <\/p>\n The protective order allows a party to designate part or all of the testimony as \u201cconfidential,\u201d defined as information that the party \u201cbelieves in good faith … is entitled to confidential treatment under applicable law.\u201d <\/p>\n According to Robertson, nothing in the firefighters\u2019 testimony warrants confidential treatment under California law. Typically, he said, \u201cconfidential\u201d information governed by a protective order refers to sensitive data like trade secrets or personal information, such as Social Security numbers and health records. <\/p>\n \u201cThese are just fact witnesses, eyewitnesses, essentially,\u201d Robertson said. \u201cWe\u2019re asking them \u2026 What did they do? What did they see in their line of duty?\u201d<\/p>\n Robertson also said that LAFD officials were in the room during Monday\u2019s depositions, \u201cwatching and monitoring what the firefighters were saying,\u201d which he suggested may have amounted to an intimidation tactic. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s very unusual,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n An LAFD spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment about why officials were in the room. <\/p>\n