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BPD dispatcher suspended for 'reprehensible' social media post

File photo

Buffalo Police Commissioner Byron Lockwood has suspended a civilian employee without pay and opened an internal investigation into what he called a "reprehensible" social media post.

Bob Marth is a dispatcher who works for several security companies, as well as a security guard for Shea's Performing Arts Center, according to his Facebook page. 
 
Protests that have taken place across the city over the last two weeks led him to attack protesters as "[expletive] WILD ANIMALS." He compares them to "an animal that's rabid out of control" and asks that Mayor Byron Brown "Allow the officers to shoot to kill !!"

A screenshot of the post is below. (WARNING: IT CONTAINS EXPLICIT LANGUAGE)

Lockwood said, in a written statement, "The Buffalo Police Department has become aware of a reprehensible social media post by a civilian employee of the Department on his personal Facebook page. I have immediately suspended the employee without pay and opened an internal investigation."

This the second quick suspension and internal investigation ordered by the commissioner in recent days. Late on Thursday, he suspended, without pay, two police officers for a shoving incident hours earlier in front of City Hall, which left a protester bleeding on the sidewalk and in the hospital. The two officers face felony assault charges.

Mike Desmond is one of Western New York’s most experienced reporters, having spent nearly a half-century covering the region for newspapers, television stations and public radio. He has been with WBFO and its predecessor, WNED-AM, since 1988. As a reporter for WBFO, he has covered literally thousands of stories involving education, science, business, the environment and many other issues. Mike has been a long-time theater reviewer for a variety of publications and was formerly a part-time reporter for The New York Times.
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