Cop Answering 911 Call Won't Send Ambulance; Decides Instead to Chastise Freaked-Out Caller for Her "Filthy Mouth"

And then, after he finally sent an ambulance... he showed up to arrest her, for "abuse of 911," a charge that the report says doesn't even exist.

Oh-- and he hung up on her twice without getting her information. He called the ambulance only after the third time she'd called, after wasting six minutes.

The police department has given him two weeks suspension, and Captain Ed argues they're right to resist firing him, as anyone can have "one bad day."

That's true, but irrelevant. If someone has a legitimate medical emergency and all you can do is complain that you overheard her say "What the fuck?" before you even answered the phone, you're in the wrong business. This shows a profound psychological defect, or at least a gross mismatch in terms of the career selected.

He's also clearly a bad cop. I know cops have high-stress jobs and take an awful lot of abuse, but this guy has the stereotypical bad-cop attitude that his badge exists chiefly to extract respect from people -- coerecively, if need be.

He's got a hard-on about indecorous language, which is his right, but he's using his position to bully people around, and in this case, he's actually willing to let someone die if he doesn't get the respect and chop-chop compliance with his bullying that he seeks.

A cop who uses his badge in this way is already a bad cop. But when that attitude extends to blackmailing people with actual death, that crosses the line from "bad cop" to "ex-cop."

Maybe Captain's right that the police department needs to resist the firing -- but everyone else in Lincoln Park and the state of Michigan needs to pressure them into firing his ass.

You have to watch this.

Instinct: He just doesn't have the right instincts, or even normal human instincts. Granted, he gets a lot of 911 calls and so is naturally less affected by this stuff than other people, but when a quavering, freaked-out human voice asks for an ambulance, you say yes. If you don't, you're wired wrong to begin with, and you're certainly in the wrong occupation.

I can just see this guy responding to a call about a girl hit by a car, and as he lifts her head out of the pool of blood, saying, "You're dressed like a whore, you know. Button it up, Tartsy McSlatternCleavage."

Sorry, dude. You need to go. You need a less stressful job where you can make your demands for a more decorous society without anyone's life being put at risk.

posted by Ace at 03:18 PM

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