MIAMI, Fla. (WFLA) — A former Miami-Dade Hearth Rescue lieutenant is going through critical fees after investigators mentioned they discovered a hidden digicam in a fireplace station lavatory.
The digicam’s micro-SD card contained greater than 600 video clips exhibiting 18 staff “whereas they have been of their most susceptible state,” in accordance with an arrest warrant obtained by NBC6.
The previous lieutenant, Manuel Fernandez, 55, is believed to have planted the digicam within the males’s lavatory at a fireplace station in Doral. Authorities mentioned he’d disguised the digicam as a wall charger plugged into {an electrical} outlet.
It wasn’t till an worker discovered the machine in April 2023 that investigators with the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Workplace began making an attempt to establish who was accountable.
In line with detectives, the movies have been recorded between Feb. 11 and April 1, 2023. In addition they discovered the identical machine had been used within the ladies’s lavatory at MDFR’s fireplace station in Homestead.
Investigators mentioned they reviewed shift rosters and located that Fernandez was the one worker working at each stations when the digicam was in use. A person sporting a MDFR uniform is also seen adjusting the digicam in one of many recordings.
The hearth division put Fernandez on paid administrative responsibility working from house in some unspecified time in the future after the digicam was found, writing in a memo the police instructed them he was “their prime suspect.” He later resigned, in accordance with NBC6.
Fernandez was taken into custody on Monday, July 7, and charged with a number of counts of video voyeurism. He later posted a $27,500 bond.
Reporters caught up with Fernandez as he was leaving jail Tuesday, and requested, “Did you set these cameras within the lavatory?”
He responded, “I don’t know.”
