Dispatchers on trial over 5-year-old’s call

DETROIT FREE PRESS

DETROIT — The first 911 call was coded by operators as “pk” for prank.

The second call, three hours later, was coded “family trouble.”

On both occasions, a 46-year-old woman lay unconscious in her nightgown on the floor of her Detroit apartment as her 5-year-old son tried to get help. And on neither call did dispatchers request EMS.

On the first call, 911 dispatcher Sharon Nichols, 45, told the boy, Robert Turner, “I’m gonna send the police to your house and find out what’s going on with you.” Then she hung up, according to transcripts. She never requested any action.

Only after the second call and a scolding did 911 operator Terri Sutton, 48, request a police response. Police arrived and found Sherrill Turner dead.

They then called for EMS assistance.

It was later learned that Turner died of an enlarged heart.

But before calling police, Sutton told Robert: “You shouldn’t be playing on the phone,” and “Now put her on the phone before I send the police out there to knock on your door, and you’re going to be in trouble.”

Both operators are on trial in Detroit’s 36th District Court, charged with misdemeanor counts of willful neglect of duty in the Feb. 20, 2006, phone calls at 5:59 p.m. and 9:02 p.m.

They face up to a year in jail if convicted.

Robert, now 7, dressed in a Spider-Man T-shirt, testified Tuesday that he put his hands on his mother’s chest and didn’t feel a heartbeat. He said he called 911.

“She hung up on me,” Robert said. “She said, ‘Stop playing on the phone.’”