Feb 11, 2009 6:49 pm US/Eastern
DeFede: Barreiro Says He Was Set Up
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
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Archive: Gus Barreiro
CBS
"Where do I begin?" an agitated Gus Barreiro asked me Wednesday afternoon.
Less than an hour earlier the Department of Juvenile Justice released an Inspector General's report outlining why the former state representative was fired in January after serving ten months as the department's head of residential programs. The IG investigation found between 300 and 400 pornographic images from an adult website on his state issued laptop computer.
"Really, where do I begin?" he repeated.
Did you download pornography onto your computer?
"Absolutely not," he said.
How did it get there?
Barreiro believes he knows. He claimed he was being set up by officials inside DJJ who were tired of Barreiro uncovering problems within the agency. Barreiro has been a longtime critic of the DJJ, going back to his days in the Florida Legislature. Barreiro broke with his fellow Republicans and exposed the state's role in the deaths of two black teenagers – Omar Paisley in 2003 and Martin Lee Anderson in 2006.
Paisley, 17, died while at the Miami Dade Juvenile Detention Center after writhing in pain for days from a ruptured appendix. He pleaded for help, but guards and nurses at the facility ignored his cries.
Martin Lee Anderson, 14, died at a Panhandle boot camp after being beaten and forced to exercise by guards at the facility.
In both cases efforts were made to cover up the truth behind the deaths and Barreiro played a key role in exposing the department's complicity.
In the case of Paisley more than two dozen DJJ officials, including the department's secretary, were either fired or forced to resign.
Barreiro continued to be a source of friction for department officials after joining DJJ. Last year, he helped a group of men who were abused in the Fifties and Sixties at the Arthur G. Dozier School for Boys in Marianna. The story of the so-called "White House Boys," has caused a new round of consternation for the department.
Barreiro claims after the White House Boys went public he was warned by people within the department that his days with DJJ were numbered and that they were going to find a way to embarrass him.
"After the White House Boys story my whole world changes," Barreiro said.
"Am I surprised?" he asked rhetorically. "No, I'm not surprised. Am I outraged, you bet I am. If they were willing to lie and falsify documents in the deaths of two young boys, then imagine the lengths they would be willing to go to get rid of me."
Barreiro claims that several people in his office had access to his laptop and his password. "I was warned by someone that I better start watching my back, so I was concerned," he said.
Fearing he might be set up, he said that on January 12 he asked a friend of his in the agency's IT department in Miami to quietly go through his computer and see if there was anything unusual. He said the report came back that it was clean.
Two days later he was ordered to turn over his computer for a random inspection. The next day he was called into his supervisor's office and was told there were numerous pornographic images on his computer and was immediately terminated.
He said he didn't fight the firing at the time because he is a political appointee and has no rights to appeal a termination. "But now I am going to fight it," he said. "Not to get my job back, but to fight what they are doing. This is not right, now they have crossed that line."
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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