Miami-Dade County's Chief of Public Safety has confirmed that the fire rescue training exercise where a firefighter's son died was not authorized.
NBC6 asked James Reyes at a scheduled campaign event Friday about the status of the investigation into the June 21 incident in Virginia Gardens. Fabian Camero, the 28-year-old son of a Miami-Dade firefighter, was rushed to the hospital after being critically injured and died a day later.
The tragic death launched a multi-department probe that remains open.
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"We will not proceed with the administrative investigation in terms of discipline until we finalize the death investigation," Reyes told NBC6.
Camero was not employed by Miami-Dade Fire Rescue. Why he was even at the training exercise remains under investigation.
"At this point, all the information shows that this particular training was not a department-sanctioned training," Reyes said.
NBC6 spoke with the owner of the building where firefighters held the training, who said Miami-Dade Fire Rescue was permitted to perform a "non-destructive" training exercise. That is also under review.
"We’re committed to transparency, we’re committed to holding the folks accountable that were ultimately responsible for this incident," Reyes said.
NBC6 has been requesting public records related to this training exercise as well as any incident reports detailing what first responders found at the scene. To date, all of our requests have been denied, with the department citing an ongoing investigation as the reason they cannot provide information.
