Kentucky 911 Failure to Fully Investigate Case

A Kentucky family is contemplating litigation following what appears to have been the failure of dispatchers and police to follow up on a report of a man in need of assistance in Whitley County back in January.

A 911 call on January 3, 2014 to Whitley County 911 reported a man “crawling in and out of the emergency lane and the slow lane” on I-75 northbound. The caller reportedly expressed a concern for the man’s safety. The body of 62-year-old William Danny Oaks was found six days later on January 9, 2014 about 150 yards away. Oaks died of “exposure to the elements”.

The caller, Derek Brown, was quoted by the Whitley Republican as saying: “I pulled over to the emergency lane on the southbound side and called 911 and told them there was a guy crawling around on the interstate and that he was going to get hit.”

Details about how the 911 call was handled remain sketchy but it appears that police were not immediately dispatched. When an officer was eventually dispatched it does not appear that the incident was handled with the seriousness that in hind sight it required. News reports indicate that Oaks suffered brain damage from an assault years ago, and may have had substance abuse issues.

While the case is not a fire or EMS case per se, it is not unlike many of the types of incidents we get dispatched to where there are sketchy details. How thoroughly do we search incidents scenes when the location of the victim is not immediately apparent? A few cases that have led to lawsuits:

• The 2009 case of Sidell Reiner of Boynton Beach, Florida who was setting her dining room table for Thanksgiving when a wine glass fell on her foot causing massive bleeding. She called for help but due to some unfortunate miscommunications problems the ambulance was delayed, and there were uncertainties about the address. By the time medics arrived she was unconscious. The medics knocked on her door and getting no response left the scene. Reiner was found dead by her husband when he returned home from an errand to pick up their grandchildren. She was just inside the doorway, feet away from where the medics had been.
• The 2010 case out of Dekalb County, Georgia where a wheelchair bound Ann Bartlett called 911 reporting a fire prompting a full structure fire assignment to be dispatched. Perhaps due in part to some confusion over the address, arriving firefighters never got off the apparatus to investigate. Not seeing any sign of fire or smoke from the street they left the scene only to be called back hours later when the house was fully involved and Bartlett was dead.

The more common cases that keep me up at night are the high-speed vehicle accidents where it appears the occupants have fled the scene, or perhaps are unconscious and unable to tell us how many additional passengers were in the vehicle with them. How much searching of the area for victims who may have been ejected is enough to assure ourselves that we have done our due diligence to account for everyone? Then there’s tracking down of that faint smell of smoke in someone’s home… Reason number 22 on why I can’t sleep at night!!!!!

Here is more on the Whitley County case.