Pawtucket officials searched lockers at the fire station. Now they're being sued

PROVIDENCE – Five Pawtucket firefighters are suing the city, Fire Chief John Trenteseaux and a police officer over what they allege were the warrantless searches of the private lockers in which they keep their personal belongings at the station.

Firefighters Noah LeBlanc, Stephen Garlick, Manuel Benevides, Scott McDonald and Steven Como accuse the City of Pawtucket of violating their rights to be free from unreasonable searches under the Fourth and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution by conducting the September search of their lockers without court authorization.

They are asking the court to bar the city from conducting similar searches in the lawsuit brought Monday in U.S. District Court by the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island. They are seeking unspecified damages for the alleged invasion of their privacy and emotional distress.

“As firefighters, we commit ourselves to the community, often spending long hours away from home at the fire station. Our personal lockers at the station are more than just metal boxes; they are a bit of home where we keep pieces of our private lives and our private belongings while we are serving the community,” LeBlanc, 10 years with the department, said in a statement. He described the unauthorized search as a “deep betrayal of trust and an invasion of our privacy” and cast the lawsuit as a stand to rebuild trust and ensure no future violations.

Grace Voll, spokeswoman for the city, referred to the arrest of former Pawtucket firefighter Patrick White outside the station in August during which he was charged with two counts each of possession of a firearm and possession of prohibited high-capacity magazines. 

“Following the arrest, a new, separate concern was raised by fellow firefighters that there may be more firearms in the shared locker area,” Voll said in an email.

“Thankfully, the Police Department responded and no tragic incidents occurred,” she said.

She added that no further comment would be made ahead of legal proceedings.

White’s arrest on firearms charges

According to the lawsuit, police officer Mario Commella obtained a search warrant from District Court Judge Stephen Isherwood in late August for White’s 2012 Silver Ford F-150 based on allegations he was transporting firearms. The search warrant did not extend to White’s personal locker, let alone other firefighters’ lockers.

White was arrested Aug. 30 outside Station 6 at 385 Newport Ave. He appeared the next day in District Court, where he didn’t enter a plea, as is customary in felony cases. The matter has since been transferred to Superior Court.

On Sept. 5, around  9 a.m., Trenteseaux, Comella and another officer entered the residential areas of the station and conducted a search of the firefighters’ personal lockers.

The suit alleges that Trenteseaux requested that the engine and rescue at the fire station be sent away just prior to the search so that no firefighters were present at the time.

The defendants, they said, gave no warning, sought no consent, and certainly received no authorization from the firefighters prior to the search.

They accuse Comella and the chief of searching their private lockers, rifling through and inspecting their personal possessions, such as prescriptions, toiletries and financial records, without consent or a warrant.

“The uniform practice, custom, and policy among the members of the Pawtucket Fire Department is that personal lockers are private; no one accesses a firefighter’s personal locker without his or her permission,” lawyers Danilo Borgas, Richard Sinapi and Lynette Labinger wrote for the ACLU.

Home away from home

Because firefighters are often on duty for 24-hour shifts, the fire station has a segregated private section that includes dedicated areas for sleeping and showering and safeguarding their personal possessions. Those residential areas serve, in essence, as the firefighters’ “home away from home during their long shifts and are an essential area of private and personal space which allows them to perform their job duties” for extensive durations, the suit said.

“This case highlights a significant overstep of legal boundaries by city officials and is emblematic of a worrying trend of overreach by those in power,” Borgas said in a statement, continuing “Their focus should be solely on their critical duties of safety and public service, not on concerns about clandestine privacy invasions and constitutional rights violations.”

The suit, Borgas said, “is about reinforcing the principle that no one is above the law, and that everyone, regardless of their role, is entitled to the full protection of their statutory and constitutional rights to privacy.”

The firefighters, the suit says, had absolutely nothing to do with any firearms in White’s possession beyond being co-workers of White.

Alleged sick leave abuses in Tiverton

White resigned following his arrest, according to Voll.

White was previously in the news. A 15-year veteran of the Tiverton Fire Department, he was fired in early 2015 for alleged sick-leave abuse between August 2012 and January 2015, according to Fire Law Blog.

He later agreed to resign and accept a $175,000 settlement to drop his quest for reinstatement, the blog reported.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Pawtucket firefighters sue city, alleging warrantless search of lockers