Story Archive

Who Ya Gonna Call?

Medical emergencies, crimes, fires: they all prompt calls to 911. Crenshanda Williams, 43, a 911 operator in Houston, Texas, fielded thousands of such calls — and simply hung up on many of them, no matter how dire the emergency, prosecutors say. Her supervisors got suspicious since her count of “short calls” — calls that lasted 20 seconds or less — was extreme: thousands of them in just a year. Hua Li, an engineer who called in a robbery at a convenience store, describes an example: “They just said, ‘This is 911. How can I help you?’ I was trying to finish my sentence,” he says, “and we got disconnected.” By the time Li was able to call back and get a different operator, the store clerk had been shot and killed. He says that if you can’t get 911 to get help in an emergency, “Nobody, nobody is going to help you. You’re on your own.” An audit has so far documented 825 calls Williams hung up on, and on one she was recorded as saying, “Ain’t nobody got time for that, for real.” Police say that Williams told them that she “often” hung up on callers “because she did not want to talk to anyone at that time.” She has been fired, and faces up to one year in jail and a $4,000 fine — for each count. (RC/KPRC Houston) ...That might be enough.