PATRICK COUNTY, Va. – The EMT in Patrick County that made national headlines for his role in a podcast popular among white supremacists that compared black people to chimpanzees and tells stories of mistreating patients may once again have a job.
Alex McNabb was put on administrative leave and banned from the JEB Stuart Rescue Squad while the state department of health investigated him, but the state has announced they did not find any medical wrongdoing.
The state did not revoke McNabb's medical license which means he is available for a job within the Commonwealth. The question is who wants him after he has made it clear he takes great joy in making jokes many find racist and offensive. Some of his jokes talk about time spent in the back of "the Band-Aid bus" which is a nickname for his ambulance but he claims the stories are purely works of fiction and he's an entertainer.
State investigators have deemed him eligible for his job in Patrick County and some are afraid that's exactly where he'll end right back up. McNabb made Patrick County a household name for all the wrong reasons after his podcast which is classified by some as a Neo-Nazi program went mainstream.
In one episode McNabb told a story of purposefully mistreating a black child by purposeful using a needle larger than appropriate to cause the child pain. But the state said it can't find any evidence of that happening.
"We thought that the best route for us was to hold and let the state do its investigation and now they have kicked the ball back into our court," JEB Stuart Rescue Squad Attorney Wren Williams said. "Which is fine at least we feel like we have the authority to do what's next and that's what the board is happy to do at this point."
McNabb can continue as an EMT, the question is will McNabb be welcomed back to the JEB Stuart squad. At an explosive meeting late last year, the squad said it was afraid of possible lawsuits by McNabb funded by deep, alt-right pockets. Board of Supervisors chairman Lock Boyce thinks McNabb will get his job back and a wrongful termination lawsuit isn't the only reason.
"I had some people in the rescue squad really aggressively support Mr. McNabb and that makes me wonder if they share Mr. McNabb's views," Boyce said, adding that he thinks Patrick County has a whole has problems with racism and white supremacy.
Despite McNabb being an EMT and talking about being an EMT on his show he maintains his persona, Dr. Narcan, is fiction and his jokes are satire about being an EMT. But in the most recent episode, McNabb and his fellow hosts used the n-word multiple times when referring to the in real life investigation.
Boyce said he thinks there are medical complaints against McNabb out there, but people are too afraid to come forward. The state health investigation focused only on the medical discrimination part of the case.
"What I was surprised at is that the state did not decide to address sort of the freedom of speech, white supremacist argument of this whole debacle," Williams said.
Williams said he's confident the squad's board will be able to decide McNabb's fate at its next meeting in two weeks. He said outside counsel will be brought in to help make the decision. Boyce led an unsuccessful campaign to strip the squad of local government funding and did not say what, if anything, he would do if the squad does hire McNabb back.