It's a fire district under siege.
Chief David Culbreth and the Board Of Commissioners are facing a criminal investigation.
The State Law Enforcement division is probing the department's finances and practices.
SLED says it received a complaint in August regarding allegations of breach of trust and embezzlement.
It was the subject of a heated board meeting Tuesday, and we asked the chief if criminal activity had or was taking place.
"There's no money missing at all," he said.
Firefighters have told NewsChannel 7 their retirement funds were missing money for months.
The chief blamed that and the SLED investigation on bad bookkeeping, and says he is making accounting improvements to correct things.
"I haven't been chief but 18 months, it just takes a long time to reorganize what's going on," said Chief Culbreth.
But some within and outside the department are skeptical.
Jeff Knight told us, "The biggest thing everybody is upset about is the reputation of the fire department."
Knight has family in the department. He is also the brother of former chief Danny Knight. At tuesday's meeting bad blood was evident between the Knight family and Chief Culbreth. But knight vows, this isn't a vendetta. He says firefighters are truly concerned.
"There's nothing personal at all, the only thing that concerns me is the name of that fire department and the taxpayers of this community."
No current firefighters would talk on camera about what they see going on, because they claim, the chief has threatened to fire anyone who talks about the investigation.
Chief Culbreth told us he is not going to talk about this case anymore. He says he is tired of the fighting back and forth. He says he is confident the SLED investigation will show nothing improper.
SLED says it is close to completing the investigation.
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