By Christine Legere
The Boston Globe
BRIDGEWATER, Mass. — A six-year veteran of the Bridgewater Fire Department has been suspended without pay for 30 days for punching Selectman Christopher Flynn in the face at a bar last Friday. Firefighter David McGillis was reportedly angered by discussion of the potential for layoffs in his department to help balance next year’s budget.
Criminal complaints relating to the incident have been filed in Brockton District Court against the 44-year-old firefighter. The complaints include one count of assault and battery and one count of a threat to commit a crime (murder). Those will be heard by the clerk magistrate, who will determine whether they have merit.
According to an incident report submitted by Sergeant Lawrence Bresciani, local firefighters McGillis, Daniel Westgate, and James Bunker were at Barrett’s Ale House in Bridgewater when they spotted the 26-year-old Flynn seated at the bar. It was about 12:15 a.m. Friday.
When Westgate and McGillis decided to approach Flynn, Bunker said he saw potential for trouble and left the bar.
McGillis told police he had asked Flynn “why he was screwing with his brother firefighters and police,” wrote Bresciani.
At this point, Flynn’s and McGillis’s recollections of events diverge. McGillis said Flynn swore at him and put his hand on his shoulder. McGillis said he then punched Flynn because he felt threatened. After McGillis punched Flynn, Westgate pulled him away.
Flynn told police he neither swore at the firefighter nor laid a hand on him.
The court complaint that McGillis threatened Flynn is based on Flynn’s claim that McGillis said he would come after and kill both him and Selectman Michael Demos if firefighters lost their jobs due to budget cuts.
Neither Flynn nor Demos returned calls from the Globe, nor did selectmen chairman Stanley Kravitz. Fire Chief George Rogers issued a written statement Monday, announcing McGillis’s suspension without pay, for violating department rules and regulations while off duty.
McGillis and four other firefighters were widely featured in news stories two years ago, when they saved the life of a 2-year-old boy who had tumbled into the family’s swimming pool. The child was dead, by medical standards, when emergency workers arrived. The child’s revival was greatly aided by a device donated by McGillis’s family in memory of his deceased brother: an EZ IO-Drill, a battery-operated drill that quickly bores a hole into the bone so that intravenous medications can be fed directly into the marrow.
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