Brought Up on Charges for Working While White Detroit: Racist Black EMS Chief Jerald James Tries to Get White EMT Paramedic Jeff Gaglio Fired For Gift Of Blanket
10/15/2012
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Detroit EMS Chief Jerald James says he brought paramedic Jeff Gaglio up on charges for “giving away city property without permission,” but that’s a baldfaced lie. No black paramedic would be facing such a sanction.

There’s something you have to know about any workplace in the City of Detroit, Wayne County, or indeed, anywhere under the rule of Jim Snow: If you are white, your bosses, colleagues, and even underlings will seek any pretext under the sun to terrorize you, rob you of your job, and even of your freedom.

They’ll make up non-existent rules, while never imposing the actual rules on black personnel.

I posted last spring on the illegal firing of white veteran Detroit worker John Chevilott, who was fired by the Wayne County Department of Public Services two years before his retirement, after he had committed an exemplary act, under a “policy” that had nothing to do with his situation. Chevilott had found a gun while working, and turned it in to the police.

The idea behind Chevilott’s dismissal was simple: To rob a dedicated, white worker of his job, benefits, and pension.

But what the DPS did to John Chevilott was nothing, compared to what racist maniacs within the Detroit Police Department did in 1992, under the direction of black supremacist Mayor “King” Coleman Young, to heroic white cops Walter Budzyn and Larry Nevers. I didn’t have to look up their names, because I know them by heart, and so should you.

Officers Budzyn and Nevers responded to a call regarding a crazy, violent, drunk, drugged-out black felon named Malice Green. And boy, did the name ever fit!

Green, who was also in possession of crack cocaine, resisted arrest with such violence, and had suffered from an enlarged heart from years of drug abuse that he died of a brain seizure and heart attack. The racists above the officers in the Detroit PD saw this as their big chance to railroad a couple of devoted white public servants in one of the nation’s two most dysfunctional, big-city police departments, the other being the New Orleans PD.

One of the players was a racist, black medical examiner named Dr. Kahlil Jiraki, who perjured himself about the cause of Malice Green’s death. Dr. Jiraki was unavailable to perjure himself in a second trial in the case, due to having finally been officially recognized as being insane. But that didn’t stop Dr. Jiraki from initiating a frivolous lawsuit against the city, and cleaning up, to the tune of $2.5 million.

Walter Budzyn and Larry Nevers were railroaded, charged with murder, prosecuted, and convicted by a racist, black Detroit jury. They spent years in prison for the crime of wearing a badge while white.

Fox 2 News Headlines

Detroit paramedic: I'm being punished for giving a cold man a blanket

By Charlie LeDuff

October 10, 2012 5:47 p.m. EDT; Updated: 5:50 p.m. EDT

FOX 2 News

DETROIT — A Detroit paramedic says he is in trouble for breaking the rules. His offense? Giving a cold man a blanket.

Top brass tell us employees must have permission to hand out "department property", but that blanket was one of many donated to the department to help people in need.

Ladies and gentlemen, this might be the most ridiculous and bone-headed Detroit ambulance story yet. It started two weeks ago when a house caught on fire. An old cripple man lived inside. They brought him outside. He was in his underwear. It was cold. He was shivering. You give him a blanket, right? Right. Then guess what happened?

"I'm being punished for giving a man a blanket," said paramedic Jeff Gaglio.

He called in sick Wednesday, sick to his stomach after being punished for giving away city-owned property.

"Yesterday I got notified that I'll be brought up on EMS departmental charges," Gaglio said.

What's that mean?

"I'm being punished. I'm being punished for giving a man a blanket, something that would seem like a common, every day courtesy. Something that any man or woman would do in the City of Detroit, give a freezing man a blanket. I'm being punished for it."

Who's punishing him?

"The chief of EMS Jerald James."

You know what makes this story even more outrageous? The city didn't even pay for the blankets. Matt Cahillane, [white] president of Firefighter Support Services, donated them.

"Anybody who's been displaced by a fire, that's what they're for," he said.

Does he mind people having to keep the blankets?

"I think that's what they're for."

I tried calling Chief James and left a message saying, "It's LeDuff. I'm downstairs. I'd like to know why you're suspending paramedics for putting blankets on old cripple people. Can you give me a call, come down here and talk?"

So we waited and waited and waited some more and finally, a couple hours later, we got our explanation.

"We can't have an employee who feels that they have a right to give away state property, be it donated, be it a blanket, be it a tire off a vehicle, without getting prior approval from somebody or notifying the proper authority. This is what he did," James said by phone.

That's right, paramedic, you'll need to get permission to give that feeble, half-naked old man a donated blanket because they're needed in the paint room for drop clothes.

"These are the important issues. Donated blankets are the important issue, not the broken-down ambulances, not the bad response time, not the people dying that can't get an ambulance, not the closing of EMS units in the city, blankets," said Gaglio.

So let's review. We're going to let old cripple guys shiver to death. We're going to take much needed paramedics off the street. I think what the fire department should do is point those hoses right at headquarters and clean the whole joint out.

 

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Here’s a December 2010 Charlie LeDuff story on the Detroit Fire Department, in which racist, black EMS Chief Jerald James was then also denying Detroiters life-saving services and punishing white paramedics.

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