Whistleblower Complaint Raises New Questions About Delayed Eaton Fire Alerts

LAist reports that a whistleblower complaint alleges an L.A. County OEM supervisor with a history of sleeping at work oversaw the overnight shift during the Eaton Fire, when evacuation alerts for West Altadena were delayed; the complaint was filed by OEM associate director Nick Vaquero, and LAist says several witnesses corroborated the broader claim about the employee’s prior on-the-job sleeping. The employee, Steve Lieberman, denied being asleep that night, and county officials disputed that he regularly slept on the job. They also said he had no responsibility for deciding or issuing evacuation alerts, arguing that the deeper problem was broader OEM understaffing, limited training, and weak procedures already identified in earlier reviews and the McChrystal after-action report. Read the LAist report here.