Harrison Twp. chief to investigate firefighter’s alleged sex act

Firefighter on unpaid leave following incident at Troy Walmart.

The Harrison Twp. firefighter accused of performing a sex act on himself at a Troy Walmart was first placed on paid leave last week before township officials this week stopped his compensation.

Keith Bousquette, 39, of Troy, was first placed on paid leave Nov. 8 following the alleged incident Nov. 7 in a Walmart parking lot. He was then moved to unpaid leave Thursday following a meeting of Harrison Twp. trustees, according to a personnel letter obtained by the Dayton Daily News. Fire Chief Mark Lynch will investigate Bousquette’s conduct.

The firefighter and paramedic is criminally charged with public indecency after Troy police received a report that he was performing a sex act on himself in the store’s parking lot on Nov. 7. A Nov. 22 arraignment is scheduled in Miami County Municipal Court.

Bousquette told Troy police the act was “a joke” to someone he thought was a friend, but “turned out that it was not.”

“I was in the Walmart parking lot and saw a vehicle I believed to be of a female friend and parked next to it,” Bousquette wrote in a statement.

The woman who reported the crime called her husband, police said, who followed Bousquette’s vehicle after the incident and was able to provide a license plate number that led to officers charging the firefighter.

The newspaper obtained and reviewed Bousquette’s personnel files under Ohio’s public records law.

In May 2013, Bousquette received a two-day unpaid suspension for reporting late to duty for a fourth time within a year, according to personnel records. The township’s policy for tardiness includes first counseling, then a written reprimand for a second tardy, and suspension for instances after that.

In August 2012, Bousquette received one day of unpaid suspension for his third time being late, according to personnel records. Bousquette’s personnel file also indicates a written reprimand in 2014 and a written reprimand in 2013 for not following chain of command. The details of those two written reprimands were not included in the personnel file.

The Harrison Twp. Fire Department website states Bousquette has been with the department since January 2008, although the firefighter’s personnel file begins with hiring documents from November 2010. In 2015, Bousquette earned a pay increase to $18.56 per hour.

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