Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Man jailed for calling 911 to complain about cop

A deputy in Lake County, Florida was going to let a man go with just a warning during a traffic stop, but the deputy said Chris Detwiller's actions, calling 911 twice to report the deputy's alleged abuse, landed him in jail.

Detwiller told the 911 dispatcher, “Can you please hurry and have a guy come here, because if this guy lays a hand on me, I'm gonna have to defend myself. The only reason why I haven't defended myself yet is because he's a sheriff,” Detwiller said during one of the calls.

The 911 calls landed Detwiller bruised up and in jail. He's charged with dialing 911 for a non-emergency, but Detwiller said he called because he was being wrongfully harassed.

“He's laying a hand on me. The whole nine. I don't appreciate this,” Detwiller said.

“OK,” the dispatcher replied.

“I've done nothing wrong to this guy,” Detwiller told the dispatcher.

"If he's complaining Scott had to put a hand on him to arrest him, well, yeah. Sometimes when you take a person into custody you have to put a hand on him," said Lt .James Vachon, Lake County Sheriff's Office.

Detwiller has never been arrested before and admits being heated when pulled over.

“If you want to leave a complaint about him I can have the supervisor call you,” the dispatcher told him during the calls.

“Correct! I need a supervisor out here,” Detwiller replied.

"The worst thing that can happen out of a traffic stop is a citation," Vachon said. “If you feel you were wronged, take the ticket and file a complaint later.”

"I'm in a lot of pain and discomfort," Detwiller said during the calls.

Detwiler was not charged with resisting arrest or resisting arrest without violence. He plans to hire a lawyer and file a complaint. (info from http://www.wftv.com/)

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Wednesday, April 7, 2010

AT&T connected Salt Lake City callers to 911 in Seattle

In late March many AT&T customers had a big and potentially life-threatening problem. When they called 911 for help, they were connected to an operator 1,000 miles away. AT&T says the problem was fixed but  doesn't know what caused it.

Utah resident Tony Sams said, "We witnessed a hit-and-run incident. We dialed 911." The dispatcher told Sams he had the wrong address, but Sams knew where he was. "I asked, ‘How is this possible? I dialed 911. I'm in Salt Lake. I've never been to Seattle," Sams says.

Somehow, his iPhone had connected him with a far-away emergency response center. He tried several more times with the same result. Finally, Sams looked up the general number for Salt Lake City police. He was told that Caller ID showed he was in Seattle.

"It doesn't make any sense that him being in Salt Lake City, dialing 911, that it would go to Seattle," said Salt Lake City police Sgt. Robin Snyder. "We're not quite sure what happened there."

When KSL News contacted Salt Lake police, they said they thought perhaps he had misdialed, or that the GPS on his phone was malfunctioning. But then officers started calling 911 from their phones, and they discovered that nearly every AT&T phone call was directed to Seattle.

(info from KSL.com)