Tanner interjected, “There was a lot of action on the street that night. A lot of radio traffic. The more calls there are, the easier it is to rank something lower in importance than you maybe otherwise would. Problem is, once something’s been given a number, there’s no going back. The dispatcher’s looking at the numbers on his screen. He’s not privy to the nature of the calls until he gets to them. He’s not going to get to a four anytime soon when he’s got a backlog of ones and twos and threes to send out to the men on the street.”
“No question the operator dropped the ball,” Amburgey mildly said. “But I think one can see how such a thing could have happened.”
I was sitting so rigidly I was barely breathing.
Boltz resumed in the same dull tone, “It was some forty-five minutes later when a patrol car finally cruised past the Petersen residence. The officer says he shone his spotlight over the front of the house. The lights were out, everything looked, quote, ‘secure.’
He gets a call of a domestic fight in progress, speeds off. It wasn’t long after this Mr. Petersen apparently came home and found his wife’s body.”
The men continued to talk, to explain. References were made to Howard Beach, to a stabbing in Brooklyn, in which the police were negligent in responding and people died.
“Courts in D.C., New York, have ruled a government can’t be held liable for failing to protect people from crime.”
“Makes no difference what the police do or don’t do.”
“Doesn’t matter. We win the suit, if there is one, we still lose because of the publicity.”
I was scarcely hearing a word of it. Horrible images were playing crazily inside my mind. The 911 call, the fact it was aborted, made me see it.
I knew what happened.
Lori Petersen was exhausted after her ER shift, and her husband had told her he would be in later than usual that night. So she went to bed, perhaps planning to sleep just awhile, until he got home – as I used to do when I was a resident and waiting for Tony to come home from the law library at Georgetown. She woke up at the sound of someone inside the house, perhaps the quiet sound of this person’s footsteps coming down the hallway toward the bedroom. Confused, she called out the name of her husband.
No one answered.
In that instant of dark silence that must have seemed an eternity, she realized there was someone inside the house and it wasn’t Matt.
Panicking, she flicked on the bedside lamp so she could see to dial the phone.
By the time she’d stabbed out 911, the killer had gotten to her. He jerked the phone line from the wall before she had a chance to cry out for help.
Maybe he grabbed the receiver out of her hand. Maybe he yelled at her or she began to plead with him. He’d been interrupted, momentarily knocked off guard.
He was enraged. He may have struck her. This may be when he fractured her ribs, and as she cowered in stunned pain he wildly looked around. The lamp was on. He could see everything inside the bedroom. He could see the survival knife on her desk.
Her murder was preventable. It could have been stopped! Had the call been given a priority one, had it immediately been dispatched over the air, an officer would have responded within minutes. He would have noticed the bedroom light was on-the killer couldn’t see to cut cords and tie up his victim in the dark. The officer might have gotten out of his car and heard something. If nothing else, had he taken the time to shine his light over the back of her house, the removed window screen, the picnic bench, the open window would have been noticed. The killer’s ritual took time. The police might have been able to get inside before he killed her! My mouth was so dry I had to take several sips of coffee before I could ask, “How many people know this?”
Boltz replied, “No one’s talking about it, Kay. Not even Sergeant Marino knows. Or at least it’s doubtful he does. He wasn’t on duty when the call was broadcast. He was contacted at home after a uniform man had already arrived at the scene. The word’s out in the department. Those cops aware of what happened are not to discuss the matter with anyone.”