Black Employees Seek Dismissal of County Fire Captain : Race relations: The group accuses the officer of harassment and of making racial slurs.

The Los Angeles County Black Employees Assn. on Wednesday called for the firing of a county Fire Department captain who they said harassed African-American employees and, in one instance, donned a simulated Ku Klux Klan mask in front of workers.

Officials of the association and dispatchers with the Fire Department said Capt. Michael Lee repeatedly made racial slurs and offending remarks to employees at the dispatch center, which is located at the department’s East Los Angeles headquarters.

His actions, they said, prompted a one-day sickout last week by several dispatchers, who were threatening to stage another sickout if action against Lee were not taken.

Following the complaints, Lee was transferred Nov. 9 to an Antelope Valley fire station, association officials said. They added that Lee went on “stress leave” on Tuesday.

Fire Department officials and Lee were not available for comment Wednesday.

But in a prepared statement, Fire Department Chief Michael Freeman said, “Several allegations, some with racial implications, have been made by employees in our communication center. All of these are being investigated at this time, and if an internal investigation shows that rule violations have occurred, appropriate action will be taken.”

William Ruffin, a representative of the association, called Lee’s alleged infractions “a continuation of what we regard as a longstanding racist policy of this department.” Ruffin said the association had been struggling for years to make the department promote black firefighters.

Melvina Lay, a black dispatcher who has been working at the center since February, said she was in the dispatch room Nov. 5 about 1:20 a.m. when Lee entered with a plastic Halloween mask that was white on one side. Lay said Lee cut out two eyeholes in the bag, put it on his head and pointed the edges up so that it resembled a mask of a Ku Klux Klansman.

She said Lee also pulled the drawstrings of the bag around his neck, “as if he was hanging himself. I couldn’t believe when I saw what he was doing. I was shocked. He was laughing. He thought it was funny.”

The only other one of the seven people in the room at the time to see Lee wearing the mask was another dispatcher, Maria Lincoln, who is white, Lee said. She said that when Lincoln turned around and saw Lee, she laughed and said, “Oh, a Ku Klux Klansman.”

Lee snatched the mask off his head before others in the room could see him, Lay said.

Lay said she felt that Lincoln laughed out of nervousness. “She later told me she was shocked, and couldn’t believe what he had done,” she said.

Lincoln could not be reached for comment.

Lay said a supervisor threatened to cite her for insubordination later that day when she refused to meet with Lee about the incident. She said that when she insisted to her supervisor that Lee’s gesture with the mask also be noted, Lee “tried to call a truce. But it wasn’t a truce matter with me.”

Lay said she had heard Lee make other racial remarks to other employees at the center during the last several months. “He got into it with blacks and whites,” she said.