Carolina Volunteer Fire Chief Charged with Inflating Firefighter Numbers

The chief of a volunteer fire department in North Carolina has been charged with falsifying reports and inflating the number of responding firefighters in order to obtain a better insurance protection rating for his organization and community.

The North Carolina Insurance Commissioner said that James Adam Berry, chief of the Griffith Volunteer Fire Department near Winston-Salem, was arrested late last week. For five years, he deliberately misstated the number of people responding to calls when he sent incident reports to the state fire marshal’s office, according to local news reports.

Berry was released on a promise to appear in court March 10.

“We have been notified of some very concerning allegations involving the Fire Chief of Griffith Volunteer Fire Department in southern Forsyth County,” reads a statement from the Forsyth County Department of Emergency Services. “We have reached out to the board of directors for the Griffith Volunteer Fire Department … for an explanation and to ensure steps are being taken to maintain fire protection for the Griffith Fire District.”

A spokesman for the Department of Insurance explained that when fire departments are able to report that more firefighters have responded to fires, that can improve their insurance ratings, which can produce better insurance rates for properties in the VFD’s coverage area.