Improving dispatching
Columbus Dispatch: A good deal of police work involves officers arriving with imperfect knowledge to the scene of a complaint or ongoing crime; they are often uncertain what they’ll face.
To the extent possible, police on the street ought to at least know what their dispatcher has been told by a caller at the scene. Gov. John Kasich is correct to focus a new police-community panel on crafting ways to improve relaying this vital communication.
Ensuring that officers are fully informed by dispatchers can help them best assess their response, said former state Sen. Nina Turner, a Cleveland Democrat and co-chairwoman of the Ohio Collaborative Community-Police Advisory Board.
That panel was created after the death in late 2014 of 12-year-old Tamir Rice in Cleveland. Tamir, who had been playing outside with an empty pellet gun, was fatally shot within seconds of a police cruiser pulling beside him. A caller to police had reported that Tamir appeared to be a juvenile and that his gun might not be the real thing. But this information was not relayed to officers.