Tuesday, March 30, 2010 Responding Fire Captain arrested during response. While on duty and responding to a medical call at the County Jail a Career Fire Captain was arrested by Deputies for being on scene, even though this department has been responding to EMS calls with the ambulance provider for over 10 years the Lake County Sheriff has decided that the FD response should be by invitation and not via medical dispatch. Upon entering the jail facility where the company was let in through the secured door the senior Deputy ordered them to leave, that they wanted the ambulance which was approx 3 minutes behind the engine, the Captain continued to insist that they should see the patient and provide care until the ambulance arrival, the Deputy satted that we was arresting the Captain and threatened to arrest the rest of the Company who retreated to inform the Chief of the situation. The patient was examined by the ambulance crew upon their arrival and the Paramedic requested the engine to return to assist with patient care and transport. The Lake County (CO) had no qualified EMT staff on duty at the time, several interatctions with this Deputy have been negative in the 1.5 years leading to this incident. Mutual aid responders are now cancelling thier agreements for fear of the escalation of incidents in this area, leaving the Fire Department with little support opportunities.

LESSONS LEARNED: Even though we are depending on our brothers and sisters in blue to act in a professional manner with due concern for patient care, this cannot always be the case!