KANSAS CITY, Mo — The Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department’s file on the deadly fire truck crash in Westport from 2021 reveals police spoke with the KCFD whistleblower as part of their investigation.
The KSHB 41 I-Team previously reported on a paramedic who raised concerns about Kansas City, Missouri, Fire Department driver Dominic Biscari, nearly three months before the deadly Westport crash. Biscari was behind the wheel of the fire truck the night of the crash.
Three people, Jennifer San Nicolas, Tami Knight and Michael Elwood, died after the fire truck and SUV collided in December 2021.
The email the I-Team uncovered had a subject line that said “horrendous driving.” It was referring to Biscari’s driving of an ambulance.
A newly discovered audio recording details the paramedic’s concerns and what she says happened after. The paramedic also noted that she trained Biscari.
“He was adequate. Could do the job. I wouldn’t have released him if he couldn’t,” the paramedic told KCPD.
The I-Team is not revealing her identity to protect her status as a whistleblower. She said she taught Biscari how to responsibly drive emergency vehicles.
“The first day after he was released off evaluation, he did in fact wreck an ambulance by turning illegally in the middle of an intersection. He pulled a U-turn,” she said.
The audio interview was part of KCPD’s 323-page investigative report looking into the deadly Westport crash.
The paramedic emailed the complaint about Biscari’s driving to her captain and a battalion chief in late September of 2021.
In that email and in her interview with KCPD, she described three incidents on the same shift. It’s the last one she said was the worst.
“He had to have been doing at least 45, 50 miles per hour, if not faster. It bottomed out the truck in the middle of the hill,” she said.
“Jarred my back. Instant headache. I screamed at him to stop. He was going to get us killed,” the paramedic continued.
When they weren’t responding to a call, the paramedic said Biscari drove fine. She reiterated how she taught him to drive an ambulance.
”Now I can tell you that I trained him to stop at all red lights. You look left. You look right. You look left again and then you proceed through the light,” she said.
“And so you trained him to stop at the red lights, clear it, and then go?,” the investigator asked.
“Yeah and stop signs. You are to stop at stop signs as well, clear them, and then proceed,” the paramedic replied.
That’s not what happened the night of the Westport crash. Biscari drove through a red light in a fire truck with lights and sirens. He crashed into a Honda SUV that had a green light.
The paramedic was unclear if her email warning was ever followed up on.
“I don’t know that he was reprimanded or anything like that,” she said.
The paramedic also said in that interview she refused to work with Biscari after that day.
His attorney, Kevin Regan,previously said Biscari was never made aware of that complaint until the I-Team’s reporting. He did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.
In court documents the I-Team revealed in September, top KCFD leaders testified they didn’t know about the complaint until after the Westport crash. On Thursday, a KCFD spokesman said he had no new information to share.
In February, the I-Team learned about a plea deal for Biscari. He was placed on probation for three years after being charged with three counts of involuntary manslaughter.
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