Information on calls, how calls can change and the tragic results.

A tragic incident and I'm glad to see the POS who killed Officer Smith is no longer here...and it shows how serious it is for people to get information. I've often told many of my victims (i.e. rookies I'm Field Training) you must check out all the data in the call slip and try and find more info before arrival at a location. One thing that always scares me is we don't train call takers enough to ask the right questions. A call drops as "Disturbance" and when you read the call slip says "two white males fighting in location..." I ask the dispatcher to verify if this is an assault in progress...if so, we run with emergency equipment and I need back up.

From what I see in the article I can't find a mistake in sending a one man unit. The suspect was not there, no report of weapons and it looked like a simple report call. Many of the people commenting on not sending a second unit don't understand if you send two men to every report call you take manpower from other more critical calls. Unfortunately, things changed quickly at the location.

Damned.

Arlington police to review procedures after officer's death, chief says


ARLINGTON -- The Arlington Police Department will review its procedures on officer responses to calls in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of rookie officer Jillian Smith this week, Police Chief Theron Bowman said.

"We'll look at what happened and see what lessons there are to be learned," Bowman said Wednesday, emphasizing that current policy was followed in response to the 911 call that took Smith to a southeast Arlington apartment Tuesday night.

Smith, 24, who had completed her police field training just two weeks earlier, went to the Arbrook Park apartments to talk to a woman who said her ex-boyfriend had assaulted her that day.

The woman, Kimberly Deshay Carter, 29, reportedly was alone with her 11-year-old daughter, so Smith went without backup, police said.

...Minutes after Smith arrived at the complex, the ex-boyfriend returned with a gun.

Barnes Samuel Nettles, a registered sex offender with a criminal record, fatally shot Smith and Carter before turning the gun on himself, police said. Carter's daughter was unharmed.

......"The fact that a single officer went to this location to take a report had nothing to do with staffing," police spokeswoman Tiara Richard said. "This call was prioritized based on the information we had at the time for a single-officer response."