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County changes background check process for cadets
Former 911 operator Matthew Sanchez hung up on a teenager last year, moments after her friend, Jaydon Chavez-Silver, was fatally shot.
Former colleagues of Sanchez say he dispatched rescue crews prior to hanging up, and say rescue crews arrived within three minutes.
Sanchez admitted he made a mistake, and resigned from AFD shortly after.
But this summer, Sanchez was accepted into the County Fire Academy but didn’t stay for long.
"This individual was sitting in a nice air conditioned room answering phones--how much worse is it when you're actually in the field dealing directly with somebody in crisis," County Commissioner Wayne Johnson said.
Wednesday afternoon, the county booted him from the academy.
KOAT checked with the county to find out how Sanchez made it in, to begin with.
A year ago the state had revoked his dispatcher license so he could never again be an operator. But the state says Sanchez still has his EMT certification, so he can still be a firefighter.
The county also said Sanchez got very high scores on his written and physical exams and passed a background check.
Target 7 also reported last year that Sanchez had been disciplined in 2012, for on-duty conduct related issues and had to take anger management courses.
"The main thing here is obviously it's not good enough. The county manager gets that. We're doing a thorough review of these processes and procedures," county spokesman Andrew Lenderman said.
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