Mar 7, 2008 10:52 pm US/Eastern
Heroic Boston Firefighter Arrested In Drug Bust
BOSTON (WBZ) ―
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Anthony Gaston has been a Boston firefighter for the last 26 years.
WBZ
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Andre Knox (left) and Richard Jackson were also arrested on drug charges.
WBZ
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Gaston is pictured here in 2002 after saving the lives of more than a dozen people in a Dorchester blaze.
WBZ
A veteran Boston firefighter, who was credited with saving more than a dozen lives in a 2002 blaze, was arrested Friday afternoon in a drug bust in Dorchester.
Boston Police say officers from the anti-crime unit were on a routine patrol on Dunlap Street at 2:40 p.m. when they noticed three people smoking inside a Boston Fire Department vehicle.
As the men opened the door, officers say they smelled marijuana. Several bags of the drug were found in the vehicle, according to police.
All three men were arrested. One of them was firefighter Anthony Gaston, a fire prevention inspector. Investigators said while he was in uniform, Gaston was not on duty at the time. Officers said he was also carrying the prescription pain-killer Percocet.
The other two men arrested were 43-year-old Richard Jackson, of Mattapan, and 41-year-old Andre Knox, of Dorchester.
Gaston, 47, has been with the fire department for since 1982.
He was given a drug test and placed on administrative leave with pay.
In 2002, Gaston was featured in a WBZ report after he saved the lives of more than a dozen people in a Dorchester blaze. Gaston was off-duty when he helped residents of an apartment building escape that devastating fire.
Gaston posted bail Friday night. All three men will be arraigned in Dorchester District Court on Monday.
There has been no comment from the Boston Fire Department.
"We do not have all the facts of the case," Ed Kelley, President of the Boston Firefighters Union, said in a statement.
"Firefighter Gaston deserves his day in court. However, if he is convicted of those charges, there is absolutely no room for that behavior on the Boston Fire Department."
Mandatory drug and alcohol testing is an issue in contract talks between the city and the firefighters union, which says it isn't opposed but wants a pay raise in exchange. Autopsies of two firefighters killed on duty last summer reportedly showed one had alcohol and the other had cocaine in his system.
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(© 2009 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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