News

Ex-Connecticut Deputy Fire Chief`s Certification Was Invalid

Jesse Leavenworth

06/04/2015

June 04--MANCHESTER -- A former deputy fire chief did not receive firefighter certification from the state training academy, and no one has come forward to say how a phony certificate ended up in his file, Eighth Utilities District officials said Wednesday.

"No one seems to know where that came from, and we've been unable to tie back how long it's been there and who put it there," acting Fire Chief Don Moore said, referring to the certificate in former Deputy Chief Todd Sise's personnel file.

Questions about Sise's certification emerged after former district Fire Chief Paul Litrico filed a freedom of information complaint to obtain a copy. Sise, 38, resigned from the fire service "when this investigation started coming out," Moore said, but he remains a paid dispatcher with the district. Sise does not face any disciplinary action, Moore said.

Sise, who had worked as a volunteer firefighter, captain and deputy chief, beginning in the 1990s, said Wednesday that he had completed partial training at the Connecticut Fire Academy when an instructor told him he could take a written exam to obtain his Firefighter I certificate. Subsequently, an Eighth District administrator told him he had passed the test, Sise said.

He said he was never formally presented with the certificate, but believed that he had obtained it fairly. Asked how the document ended up in his file now that he knows it was invalid, Sise said, "I think I must have failed the exam and somebody tried to be a nice person for me because they knew I was struggling in the class. That's guesswork on my part."

Litrico requested a copy of Sise's certificate in October, but district President Mary O'Marra wrote to Litrico that disclosure would be an invasion of Sise's privacy. Sise also signed a document objecting to disclosure.

Litrico then complained to the state Freedom of Information Commission. Just before a scheduled hearing on May 28, Sise wrote to the district's attorney, John LaBelle, that he had reconsidered and would allow release of the certificate.

"I feel that dragging this out with the FOI hearing, then a good chance once again in court, seems like a waste of resources," Sise wrote, according to files released by the FOI commission.

Litrico received the document at the hearing, and the case will be dismissed, according to FOI hearing officer Clifton Leonhardt.

The document in Sise's file includes signatures of the chairman and administrator of the state Commission on Fire Prevention and Control. Dated May 7, 1996, the document says Sise had successfully completed training requirements and education standards in the state to be certified as a Firefighter I.

The state does not require fire service personnel to be certified, according to information on the commission's website (ct.gov/cfpc/site/default.asp). Local fire departments set their own certification requirements, according to the commission.

Eighth District fire officers are required to be certified, but Sise became an officer before Moore was named acting chief in December, and Moore said he had no role in the decision.

Asked if district leaders suspect any wrongdoing on Sise's part, O'Marra said, "From everything we have ascertained, he was not aware that it was a falsified document." Officials have been unable to track down the person or persons who forged the document, she said.

Asked Wednesday why he sought a copy of Sise's certificate, Litrico said he could not comment while his lawsuit against the district is pending.

Litrico filed suit last year over his arrest in 2012 on charges that he falsified attendance records for fire calls. Manchester police said Litrico submitted a letter certifying that 17 members of the department qualified for a tax abatement when only three appeared to be eligible.

In September 2013, however, a judge dismissed the charges after a prosecutor at Superior Court in Manchester said he lacked evidence to move forward with the case.