Cal Fire employee Robert Hernandez, accused of starting 5 Northern California fires, spent months as inmate firefighter [Video]

SAN FRANCISCO — A California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection employee charged with starting five brush fires spent months as an inmate firefighter after being convicted of causing a fatal collision, according to officials and public records.

Robert Hernandez, 38, was arrested last Friday at the Howard Forest Fire Station in Healdsburg, California, on suspicion of arson to forest land, Cal Fire said. Hernandez worked as an apparatus engineer for the agency, operating and maintaining fire engines and water tanks during emergency responses.

A court complaint filed by the Sonoma County District Attorney’s Office revealed Hernandez’s criminal record and subsequent experience as an inmate firefighter, the Press Democrat reported Wednesday.

Records show he was convicted of gross vehicular manslaughter while intoxicated, stemming from a 2016 collision in San Bernardino. He received a six-year prison sentence but in 2018 was granted participation in a rehabilitation program that lets incarcerated people join fire camps across the state, the …