ARLINGTON -- The night rookie officer Jillian Michelle Smith was fatally shot, a 911 dispatcher failed to follow city policy and "consciously decided" to withhold critical information that could have placed other police officers in harm's way, city officials testified Monday.
The city of Arlington fired Joan Ware earlier this year for her handling of communications last December when Smith was shot in the head moments after arriving at the Arbrook Park Apartments to take a domestic dispute report. Ware is appealing her termination at a two-day arbitration hearing.City officials said during the hearing that Ware was derelict in her duties by waiting about 15 minutes to send an officer to check on Smith, who had stopped answering her radio moments after arriving at the complex. Ware failed to treat the lack of communication with Smith as an emergency and also did not notify officers en route to the complex about a 911 call from a child saying that a police officer there had been shot, they said."Ms. Ware had information that she did not pass onto the officers," testified Assistant Fire Chief Brian Riley, who said Ware's termination was justified. "It put them in grave danger responding to that call."Attorney Richard Carter called the city's decision to fire his client an "overreaction."Ware, who had a spotless record during her nine years as a telecommunicator, was working frantically on what she believed were two separate emergency calls -- a missing officer and a shooting at an apartment complex -- and was not derelict in her duties, Carter argued.Detailed 911 callCommunications Manager Rhonda Shipp said Ware violated several rules the night of Dec. 28, 2010, when Barnes Samuel Nettles fatally shot Smith and his ex-girlfriend Kimberly Carter before killing himself.Carter's 11-year-old daughter escaped the apartment and ran to a neighbor to call 911, reporting that her mother's boyfriend had just shot a police officer.The neighbor reported being able to see an empty police car -- which dispatch verified was Smith's patrol car 422 -- in the parking lot.Minutes earlier, Smith had keyed the microphone on her uniform and then did not respond to repeated attempts to reach her.Ware did not notify officers dispatched to check on Smith's welfare of the reported officer shooting."To her own admission, she said she did not believe the caller," Shipp said. "It is not our place to determine whether the caller is telling the truth or not. It's critical to officer safety that we provide all the information we have."Shipp said the child's phone report about the shooting was very detailed."It was very graphic," Shipp said.Didn't follow policyWhen asked why she didn't treat the girl's report seriously, Ware reportedly told internal affairs investigators, "I believe my mind-set was 'This is a girl. She probably doesn't know what she's talking about.'"She also reportedly told investigators: "Sometimes citizens report things that are not correct or they saw things that didn't happen."Officials said Ware should have also immediately dispatched officers to check on Smith but waited about 15 minutes to send a single officer to check on Smith's welfare instead of following city policy, which was to make an emergency call and send two officers and a supervisor to investigate whether Smith was in distress.Susan Schrock, 817-709-7578Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
