Girl Arrested after Cursing on 911 Call (dad was having a seizure)

[Liberal_in_LA]

http://arkansasmatters.com/content/news/weirdnews/fulltext?cid=219041

Girl Arrested after Cursing on 911 Call
Reported by: RNS Newsroom Solutions

Thursday, May 7, 2009 @08:20am CST

A 17-year-old Michigan girl was arrested recently after cursing while calling 911 and having the operator hang up on her without sending an ambulance or asking what her emergency was.

The Lincoln Park, Michigan girl, Adrianne Ledesma, arrived home to find her father, who had just undergone brain surgery, on the floor having a seizure. In a panic, she dialed 911 but the line went unanswered.

She hung up and called back, while muttering a choice expletive, unaware that the call is recorded even before the operator answers.

On a recording of the call, Ledesma is heard shouting the expletive just as the operator, Sgt. Robert McFarlan, answers. He proceeds to admonish the girl for cursing and in response she shouts, quote, "send me a (expletive) ambulance." He then calls her a curse word and hangs up on her.

She then called a third time and threatened to sue the officer, while asking for his name. He called her a "buffoon," hung up on her again and never asked about her emergency.

McFarlan finally called the police department, telling them, quote, "I kept getting a 911 call from a filthy-mouthed girl who wanted a rescue. I never found out what it was and I was never able to transfer it over to you."

When Ledesma goes to the police station in person, the same operator, Sgt. Robert McFarlan, arrests her on a charge of abusing 911.

The girl's father eventually got help, while Sgt. McFarlan got two weeks suspension without pay and has to attend some training classes.

[davidinalameda]

1. he should be fired!

[wroberts189]

13. I'll second that..

911 operators are supposed to be trained to handle upset people.. not hang up on them and refuse to help.


No training or suspension will ever change this cops basic character.

[DS1]

48. beaten, set on fire, and left to crawl to a disconnected public phone

fuck him

[shadowknows69]

49. remind me never to piss you off.

[madmusic]

56. Because Torture R Us! nt

[davidinalameda]

65. I wouldn't quite go that far

but to each his own

[cabluedem]

55. Contempt of Cop is what I call it. Cops swear a motorists when citing the all the time.

I hope the family sues this officer. He lost his cool and a man could have died to to his beligerance.

[jbnow]

60. I had a client arrested for swearing. She'd called the police

because her boyfriend was trashing the apartment in some fit of anger, breaking glass, the TV etc and just raging.
They came and saw her antidepressants on the refrigerator, called out some mental health insult about her to cop in the next room. She went outside to wait because her boyfriend was cursing and threatening her.
They told her they couldn't do anything because she had invited him in. She asked them to at least take him away from there and they refused. At some point she said something like "What the f*ck am I supposed to do?" They arrested her, leaving him to destroy her apartment and belongings.
While at the police station one of the cops who arrested her said "sh*t". She asked if that was illegal too. He said no, sh*t is a biological function. She said the word she used is as well. He was not amused.
She ended up with a $250 fine. Crazy

[Massacure]

2. Two week suspension? He deserves to be fired.

[Echo In Light]

25. Well, you know how accountability goes within American authority structures

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. What a fracking irresponsbile 911 operator

Sergeant we all get called choice names from time to time. Quite frankly you should have been fired!

Now, there I feel much better.

[Fumesucker]

4. One of the reasons I'm very reluctant to call the cops..

No matter what the emergency.

Too many of them are officious jerks.

I hope the woman's father is OK..

[poverlay]

29. I'll second that. When I find a truly cool cop I'm completely shocked. My wife's uncle is/was a

cop for his entire career, and he seems to have this arrogance about him that makes him somewhat unpleasant to be around. He's a really nice guy, likely give you the shirt off his back, but he always acts like he knows more than anyone in the room regardless of the subject.
I always thought that attitude was a necessary defense mechanism for someone who is surrounded by the dregs of humanity and unspeakable horrors day in and day out. Then I met a few officers who weren't like that and realized that some people are just power-hungry assholes~ petty tyrants.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

5. When are cops going to pay serious fines for violations of civil rights?

Who DOESN'T know someone who has been arrested on these "fuck you" type charges they know won't stick? or threatened with same?

[ProgressiveProfessor]

21. Police unions will not allow that to happen

In fact unless its an outrageous act, most departments will assert sovereign immunity (its not just for Repuke Whitehouse personnel).

[Snazzy]

34. somewhat outrageous to infer unions have anything to do with it, isn't it n/t

[ProgressiveProfessor]

43. Not at all. IN CA both the police and correction unions have gotten a level of protection of their

members written to law that is scary. Same ting with defending the bad apples.

[madmusic]

57. More than that. they are in control

And have their own Bill of Rights which is better than our Bill of Rights.

[ohheckyeah]

6. Did she hurt his sensitive little

feelings? Good grief.

[Avalux]

7. So WHY was she arrested?

Her father might have been dying, she was panicking and upset, said the word "fuck" to a *GASP* police officer (a RUDE one). Poor girl.

[Liberal_in_LA]

8. more from another article;

17-year-old Adrianne Ledesma.

Lincoln Park
, Michigan girl Adrianne arrived home to find her father, who had just undergone brain surgery, on the floor having a seizure. In a panic, she dials 911 - but the line rings
with no answer. She hangs up and calls back
, not aware that the call is recorded even before the operator answers.

She is heard on the recording saying "What the f*ck" as the line continues to ring and she becomes more and more upset. Just as she shouts this, the operator answers - the operator is Sgt. Robert McFarlan.

McFarlan proceeds to admonish the girl for cursing, possibly wasting precious life-threatening time, to which Adrianne responds "Send me a f*cking ambulance!"

McFarlan, being the prude that he is, hangs up the phone.

Adrianne calls back again and says, "Uh, are you going to send me an ambulance?"

McFarlan responds by saying, "Are you going to swear again you stupid a*s?!"

So the very thing the officer was admonishing the girl for he then does - and eventually hangs up on her again.

http://www.postchronicle.com/news/original/article_212228194.shtml

[wroberts189]

17. So the cop swore back at her.. what a piece of work.

Did this guy get any 911 training at all?

[Vidar]

22. Typical for my state. Calling the cops too often results in the victim being arrested.

[spoony]

32. I remember the tragedies in the last few years

that have resulted from idiotic 911 operators in Michigan. That woman who was shot in the head calling and being told she was a liar. The little boy who wasn't believed when he called for his mom, who later died. Countless stories that never made it to the news. Now this. This state needs to crack down, hard, on this bullshit.

[orleans]

67. this cop is the freakshow who should be arrested. what a motherfucker! n/t

[wroberts189]

16. Unfortunatly when she goes to the police station she deals with the same idiot cop. nt

[Joe Chi Minh]

38. Maybe if she's struggled to suppress her extreme emotional state, she'd have had a heart attack.

A lot of good that would have been in the situation.

[merh]

9. I hope they dropped the charges against her

and that ass should be fired, forget further training - he is beyond help.

[wroberts189]

20. I would guess it will get dismissed ..once her lawyer threatens to sue.

Defense lawyer to jury or pre-trial judge: She called for help ..she was denied help and her dad almost died ..how is that abusing the 911 system?

This poor girl suffered severe emotional distress.


Prosecution: We will drop the charges if you do not sue us.

[Occulus]

26. Defense: stick it up your ass sideways, Prosecution. We're going to trial anyway.

Hasn't this already happened at least once in a nearby big town called Detroit? I could swear I read about it once somewhere....

[wroberts189]

33. Yes prosecutors are not always the brightest batch.

I am not sure if its happened before but it does sound familiar.

But they have no proof of abuse ..even fools avoid cliffs.

Unless we are dealing with a whole corrupt system there. In that case I'll just sit here, shut up , and sip on my beer.

[Gregorian]

10. I'm watching a revealing documentary on torture.

What a fucked up country.

Think of the children! What bullshit. People and their silly values and fears.

What we did to people in those prisons is simply unbelievable. Swearing on a 911 call during an emergency? Waht the fuck.

[Subdivisions]

11. Which documentary? Is it available online? n/t

[Gregorian]

14. Linktv. It's cable. Directv channel 375

It's comprehensive. Video clips of Bush, Cheney, etc. that are revealing. Video and photos and detailed descriptions of what we did to prisoners. Just abhorrent.

We've been kept in the dark. Seeing this makes me all the more serious about seeing prosecutions.

Cheney ordered this stuff.

[Blue_Tires]

54. yeah, Link TV is great!

[proud2BlibKansan]

12. Shortly after 911 was put in place,

a student at my school was at the dinner table with her family and her dad had a heart attack. So she picked up the phone and called 911, just as we had taught the kids to do at school that very day.

The dispatcher asked her how old she was and she said 9. The dispatcher told her to stop playing games and hung up on her.

Her father died.

[chrisa]

36. Wow.

:wtf:

That's horrible.

[proud2BlibKansan]

64. I think about that girl a lot.

She would be in her 30s now. I wonder if she remembers her dad every time she hears anything about calling 911. :cry:

[drm604]

15. I seem to recall a similar incident a number of year ago.

The caller was upset about their family member being sick or injured, and cursed at the operator. The operator then hung up on her. If I recall correctly, the operator lost her job and there were no charges of any kind even considered against the caller.

You would think that, especially after the first incident, operators would be trained to stay on the phone no matter what.

I would think that most people who suddenly find themselves in a life or death situation would have a tendency to swear. If a 911 officer can't handle that, they should find a different job.

[lpbk2713]

18. Whatever happened to the concept of 'public service'?

Doesn't seem that long ago that you didn't have to beg and say 'pretty please' to get
some assistance out of taxpayer funded emergency services when you were in dire need.

[konnichi wa]

28. I worked my way through college as a dispatcher at the PD of a fairly large city

back in the late 1960s. Two people were assigned to handle all emergency calls back in those days.
Many nights (I worked the 'graveyard' shift, midnight to 8 AM so I could go to class) one of us would go riding around with one of the cops and the other would be the only link between the public and the police. We tried to do as much as possible to "protect" the people in our town but mostly we just responded to stuff that had already happened.

One thing we would NOT do was ridicule or otherwise treat any caller with less than complete respect, even when they reported things like "headless people sitting on my car out in the driveway." (that happened more than once and isn't even the oddest thing)
\

[napi21]

19. When I read the "attend training classes" I can't help but ask if he

ever had any training to be able to handle the 911 desk before? I honestly believe most of the people on emergency call phone duty are very good at what they do. It sounds to me like this guy was a cop, pulled off the street where he encountered a lot of cop hatered. and he was never trannsitioned into a job like this. Shame on the community that let this happen!

[LuvNewcastle]

30. My brother used to answer 911 calls.

While some of the dispatchers went on to become cops, I never heard of cops taking 911 calls. Maybe this was in a small town or rural area. Many municipalities, etc. are forever hiring dispatchers because it's a stressful job and no one wants to do it. Maybe the cop was just filling in? What ever the case, he should've known better than to respond that way.

[SoxFan]

23. Fire his ass

His ego damn near cost a man his life. That's absolutely inexcusable.

[konnichi wa]

24. 911 "operators" these days are mostly just ignorant scum. There, I said it.

And it is true...every time I hear a playback of a 911 call, I wonder How the FUCK did this asshole ever get a job, let alone one that's supposed to be in public service. Yeah, not every single one is an imbecilic fuckwit but it really does seem that most of them are.

[Kaleva]

27. I'm always polite when I call 911

My wife suffers from seizures and in the few instances where she has had a bad one where she flipped herself off the bed or the couch, I've called 911 requesting an ambulance as I did not know if she had injured herself in the fall.

When dealing with emergency services, I feel I can request assistance but I cannot demand it. But that's the way I was raised.

[northernlights]

35. well, congratulations for you...except

This was a 16 year old kid, not an adult. And this was her *father* (read: caretaker on whom she is dependent), not her partner (read: equal). And this was likely her 1st call into 911 (read: first life and death emergency), not something she was accustomed to.

She was unable to get through and hung up on repeatedly.

Not exactly equivalent situations...in any way, shape or form.

The officer should be fired. If that's how he handles phone emergencies, he must be a real gem face-to-face. Holy crap. :(

[Joe Chi Minh]

40. One should always endeavour to be polite in such circumstances, as,

I'm sure that young lady did.

However, sometimes in extreme emergencies, where time is of the essence, for instance, serenity is a very questionable human response. Unless the person has maybe spent several decades in an ashram.

And no. If you pay your taxes, recourse to your emergency services is a right, not a matter of arbitrary largesse on their part. It is unfortunate that you were raised without that knowledge. That police sergeant was a public servant, no less.

And if you don't earn enough to pay taxes, the state is at fault.

[Raineyb]

52. Anyone who gets upset when they hear cursing in the 911 line is a fuckwit

who deserves to lose his job. The one thing you should not have to worry about when dealing with an emergency is that the person on the other end of the line will hang up because they were offended by salty language. You are allowed to demand 911 service it's not something that's offered out of altruism.

[Withywindle]

59. I admire that, but it sounds like you're practiced in dealing with your wife's illness.

Emergency services -- by definition - deal with people in terrible situations who are usually panicking. Panic-stricken people (especially kids, especially the first time they've been in a situation like this) are, by definition, NOT necessarily always polite and rational. That's just being human. Sorting through that and helping anyway is a big part of what the emergency services fields are all about. People who can't handle that shouldn't be doing that kind of job, because it's a matter of life and death.

[Kaleva]

61. Practiced now but not in the beginning

I'm not condoning what the police office did and he got the bare minimum (suspension and mandatory training). I'm just saying that I don't curse when calling for an ambulance and I even say "Thank You!" when I have finished giving the important info.

[suede1]

31. Fired, made a pariah and then jailed. That's what should happen if there is to be any justice.

[Hepburn]

37. Jesus Fucking Christ...

...someone swearing during a tense, life threatening situation.

Well, yeah...arrest that person immediately!

:sarcasm:

[ejpoeta]

39. i don't understand. did she swear after having to call back because she was hung up on?

because i don't blame her if that is the case and she is not the one who should be in trouble.

[Liberal_in_LA]

41. She cursed 'to herself' when her 911 wasn't picked up immediately, then said

'send the f***** ambulance' in response to the cop lecturing her, rather than handling the emergency, at this point the cop hung up on her.

[ejpoeta]

42. how is she friggin arrested then!! i can't say as i blame her she is stressed

trying to help her dad and probably scared and the 911 operator isn't taking her seriously. what is going on with these people! i know it seems like it's not a regular problem, but people could die from this kind of stuff.

[Political Heretic]

50. You can't blame her cause she's stressed? How about, she has broken no laws.

Swearing on the phone, even to an asshole cop, is not against the law.

[mnhtnbb]

44. I called 911 about 4:30 a.m. when our house was burning and the FD

was here within 5 minutes.

The 911 operator did everything possible to keep me calm, because I was in a complete panic.
I couldn't tell you if I was swearing or not, but I'm sure the operator could tell from the sound
of my voice that I was really, really, distressed.

[mnhtnbb]

46. Many years ago in Los Angeles I called 911 and waited 45 minutes

for the call to be answered. I really unloaded with the sarcasm when someone finally came on the line saying, "Gee I'm glad no one was being shot, or having a heart attack, or the house burning down."
I got an icy response, but the guy did deal with the problem. I had already called the administrative
number for the local police and they told me to call 911 even though I just wanted to report a disturbance,
not an emergency.

[davsand]

45. I'm a government person and I get sworn at. Nobody ever got arrested for that.

I'm not emergency services but I have been sworn at by taxpayers on the telephone. I will admit that they get "disconnected" when they swear at me, but I also deal with property taxes--which is not an emergency situation. Nobody that ever swore at me was ever arrested for it--and I'm pretty sure some of them called back a few times...

Being a 911 operator is a very high pressure thing and I cannot imagine doing that job and not realizing that there are a lot of people who completely fall apart when they are reporting the need for an ambulance. I'd agree that guy needs "more training" at a minimum.

The city is very lucky that man did not die, because that sounds like a huge liability case to me. My guess is this will all be settled out of court with all charges dropped and an undisclosed cash award to that family. I'm betting the PI lawyers are drooling over this case.


Laura

[Blue Diadem]

47. He should be fired.

This is one of those cases where I hope she can sue for being falsely arrested. She was not abusing 911.

[etherealtruth]

51. Share your opinion of this incident with the Mayor of Lincoln Park

Lincoln Park Mayor Frank Vaslo

Email Mayor Vaslo: [e-mail] <[e-mail]>

A bit of information: Lincoln Park is a "working class" urban area; it is a part of Metro Detroit

[Th1onein]

62. I just sent this email to the Mayor

What is the deal with arresting the girl in Lincoln Park for "abuse of 911"? And why wasn't the cop fired for repeatedly hanging up on her? We taxpayers are ENTITLED to emergency service and it's pretty obvious that people often get upset when they are in an emergency and sometimes they curse.

In fact, I'm pretty upset about the arrest of this girl, and I'm upset that the cop who hung up on her wasn't fired. What an asshole. You people need to fucking treat your employers (hint, hint: the taxpayers) better!

----------------------------
And, by the way, I signed my real name and put my phone number in it, too. I hope they like it.

[fishwax]

53. This story is at least seven months old

I'm not sure why it's suddenly cycling through again, but here's a story from last October about the incident: http://www.wxyz.com/mostpopular/story/WILSON-Emergency-Aid-Delayed/8UXeuN7eFkytW0KGC5IDKg.cspx

Cracked.com also covered it, in their "5 Horrifying Tales of 911 incompetence":http://www.cracked.com/article_17150_5-horrifying-tales-911-incompetence.html

No less outrageous all these months later, of course, but I just thought I'd call attention to the timeline :)

[WI_DEM]

58. He should be fired because he obviously can't handle taking his job.

[JonLP24]

63. WTH? What about cops that curse out suspects?

[Raejeanowl]

66. He Needs To Be Fired

And his colleagues need to be taught in no uncertain terms that the primary objective of 911 service is to answer the phone to get the critical information and render help to the victim/s first, and worry about the @#$%& language used by the caller later.

What a maroon!

[texasleo]

68. what an ass