Published: October 22, 2007 08:46 am            

When the Lifeline Fails

View from the Bench

One of the most thankless tasks of modern society has to be that of the emergency dispatcher. In nearly every jurisdiction, hundreds, even thousands of telephone calls pour into 911 centers every day. Most calls are routine, some are downright comical. A few are tragic. There is always something familiar about the latter. Strangers’ voices made familiar by desperation and fear – emotions that we can all easily recognize and with which we can empathize.

Despite the professionalism of nearly every emergency dispatcher, now and again, mistakes are made. We know that for every chilling second of a “real” emergency call, someone’s life is slipping away or perhaps already lost. And every once in awhile, the 911 system “fails with disastrous and fatal consequences,” according to Jeffrey Hickman, an author extolling the abolishment of governmental immunity as a defense for negligent handling of 911 calls.

It should not be surprising that calls to 911 do not always result in the proper response. The first 911 call was made in 1968 in Haleyville, Ala., but it wasn’t until 1999 that Congress directed that “911” be the official emergency telephone number within the United States.

Nearly the entire United States is now served by some form of an emergency dispatch center. The proliferation of cellular phones means that 911 centers no longer receive a single call for help as in years past. Oftentimes these 911 centers receive dozens of calls involving the same incident.

According to Kentucky’s Commercial Mobile Radio Service Board, wireless calls to 911 centers now far exceed those made from traditional telephones.

Deficient responses to 911 calls vary widely. A caller’s request for an ambulance due to a severe headache was rebuffed – the 911 operator suggested instead that the victim take an aspirin – and the victim suffered a stroke and ultimately died.

A gunshot victim begs for help for 48 minutes in a recorded 911 call. Dispatchers ignore the address provided by the victim, choosing instead to send police to incorrect address gleaned from a faulty computer system.

Just this week, it was disclosed that dispatchers for the California Highway Patrol ignored as many as five 911 calls that reported a forest fire on the rim of Lake Tahoe. That fire ultimately destroyed 254 homes and burned 3,100 acres of mountainous terrain surrounding the lake.

Society has taught us to rely on 911 for nearly every critical situation. Hickman writes, “[v]irtually all emergency vehicles carry signs advertising the 911 service, telephone directories direct callers to 911 for emergency assistance, children are taught in school to call 911, and many communities have signs posted on streets that advise passers-by that they are entering a 911 community.” Yet courts routinely reject this reliance as a basis to impose liability when 911 does not deliver upon the promise to help.

Victims often assert that the statutory duty to operate a 911 center imposes a duty upon that governmental entity to properly respond to calls for assistance. These victims argue that when the governmental entity breaches that duty, they should have to pay for that negligence.

Courts generally focus on the nature of the “duty” imposed by statute. If the duty is owed only to the general public, courts generally hold that the emergency centers are immune from suit. However, if the court determines that the statutes authorizing the 911 center create a “special duty” between the victim caller and the dispatch center then the 911 center must perform in a non-negligent (i.e., “reasonable”) manner.

We are fortunate in this area to be served by competent and well-trained emergency professionals. Perhaps that is why in Kentucky, no published court decision expressly sets forth the duties of a 911 center. Legalities aside, we all want to know that our “lifeline” is always ready. Hopefully, our courts will never be called upon to decide such a heart-rending issue.

        

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