By David Smiley
Miami Herald
MIAMI — Against the urging of the NAACP and the city’s Black Professional Firefighters Association, Miami’s fire union will represent six firefighters fired last month after an African American colleague found that someone had drawn lewd images on his family photos and left a noose in his fire station dorm room.
The executive board of the Miami chapter of the International Association of Firefighters agreed Tuesday to represent the six men in their efforts to regain their jobs. The decision followed a review of the city’s investigative documents of the Sept. 10 incident. The union could have left the men to pay for their own representation, but agreed to put its resources behind the ex-firefighters as they seek to be reinstated by an independent arbitrator.
In all, 11 people were disciplined in the incident, with the six fired men blamed for their roles in drawing penises on Robert Webster’s family photos. None of the fired men is accused of fashioning or draping the noose around Webster’s belongings, as the city’s internal investigators were unable to determine who was responsible.
Webster told WPLG Tuesday that he wanted the firings to be upheld.
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