The former Los Angeles fire chief Kristin Crowley has filed a lawsuit against the city, alleging that Mayor Karen Bass’s decision to fire her in 2025 followed what Crowley described as misinformation and a political effort to deflect scrutiny after the Palisades Fire.
Crowley’s legal filing, made last week, comes after Bass sacked her a month after the Jan. 7, 2025 fire and after Crowley lost an appeal to the Los Angeles City Council in March 2025, court papers and the allegations describe. In the lawsuit, Crowley says Bass’s office promoted misinformation in the aftermath of the wildfire in order to protect Bass’s political reputation, according to the Associated Press report.
The mayor’s office, through a statement from Yusef Robb, said the lawsuit has no merit. Robb said there was “nothing new here” and pointed to the reasons Bass gave for the removal, citing Crowley’s “failure to predeploy and her decision to send 1,000 firefighters home instead of keeping them on duty on the morning the fires broke out,” the statement said. The report also said a message seeking comment was sent to the LA City Attorney’s office.
Crowley’s lawsuit disputes Bass’s account of the circumstances and response in the days around when the fire began. The filing accuses Bass of trying to distract from criticism by raising claims related to Crowley being in Africa for a presidential delegation when the blaze started, while Crowley’s filing argues weather reports had already warned of dangerous wildfire conditions before she left.
The suit also challenges specific statements that Bass made to shift blame. The lawsuit alleges Bass falsely claimed she was not aware of the nationally anticipated weather event, falsely claimed that the Los Angeles Fire Department’s budget was not cut, and falsely claimed that the department’s resources would have supported an additional 1,000 firefighters to fight the blaze. Crowley says those alleged false statements were not mistakes but part of a deliberate strategy to divert scrutiny from Bass’s decisions and avoid accountability, according to the filing described in the AP report.
Crowley’s lawsuit asks the court for unspecified economic and compensatory damages. Bass fired Crowley on Feb. 21, 2025, about six weeks after the fire began, and the AP report said she praised Crowley early during the firefighting effort but later concluded that additional staffing could have been deployed on the day the blaze ignited.
Bass also cited the firefighting department’s internal process related to investigations of what happened and why. According to the AP report, Bass said Crowley rebuffed a request to prepare a report that would play a critical role in those investigations, and Crowley’s filing disputes Bass’s claims.
The Palisades Fire began Jan. 7, 2025, in heavy winds. The Associated Press report said it destroyed or damaged nearly 8,000 homes, businesses and other structures and killed at least 12 people in Pacific Palisades, an affluent neighborhood in Los Angeles. Another fire started the same day in Altadena, east of Los Angeles, killing at least 17 people and destroying or damaging more than 10,000 homes or other buildings, the report said.
When Crowley was removed from the top job, the AP report said she was demoted three ranks to assistant chief and currently serves in a “special duty” position with the department’s Risk, Health and Safety Division, as described in the court papers.