Minorities with the city Fire Department are routinely subjected to racial harassment, a black captain testified yesterday in Brooklyn federal court.
Paul Washington, a 23-year FDNY veteran, recalled that soon after 9/11, a flier announcing a memorial service for black firefighters killed at the World Trade Center was put on the Ladder 131 bulletin board in Brooklyn.
It was soon defaced with references to the Jackson 5, Tupac Shakur, Busta Rhymes, Gary Coleman, and Diddy, he told federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis.
Then there was the day a white firefighter put on a KKK hood right in front of a black co-worker yet got only a minor reprimand.
And the noose left on a black firefighter’s gear, which got the city sued.
Garaufis is seeking ways to attract more minorities to a department that is only 3 percent black in a city that is 26 percent black.