Add 16 Fire Inspectors, Cite 17 Vets

The Fire Department inducted 16 Fire Prevention Inspectors into its ranks and honored 17 others for outstanding performance Oct. 11 during a ceremony at FDNY headquarters in Brooklyn.

"The importance of the work you do cannot be overemphasized," Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta said during the ceremony. "Preventing fires is the best way to fight fires, and you are our first line of defense in preventing fires."

The 16 new Inspectors are Festus Akinrodoye, Pedro Alvarez, Adekunle Banjoko, Christopher Barrett, Alfredo Bautista, Christopher Creary, Andrew Deheer, Riches Geebro, Sean Green, Edmund Kun, Wilson Odumuwagun, Jose Palacios, Gregory Pierre, Alec Schroeter, Vincent Thompson and Miguel Yulfo.

The winners of the 2007 outstanding service citations were Eugene Kaplan, Benjamin Leonen, Lian Lui, Darryl Chalmers, Michael Kavolius, David Franco, Maria Rivera, Gregory French, Sergey Voyevodin, Leroy Dyer, Barry Parmanan, Aleksandr Skor, Boris Fourmanov, Yevgeniy Shifrin, James Richards, Manuel Costales and Stanislav Prosalov.

Fire Prevention Inspectors are a part of the Bureau of Fire Prevention.