Latisha Rogers, an assistant office manager at the supermarket, told The Buffalo News that she had called 911 while hiding inside the store and was whispering on the phone to avoid the gunman’s attention.
She said the dispatcher admonished her for speaking quietly on the call.
“She was yelling at me, saying, ‘Why are you whispering? You don’t have to whisper,’” Ms. Rogers told The News, “and I was telling her, ‘Ma’am, he’s still in the store. He’s shooting. I’m scared for my life. I don’t want him to hear me. Can you please send help?’ She got mad at me, hung up in my face.”
In a separate interview with The New York Times, Ms. Rogers said she ducked down behind the store’s customer service counter when she first heard gunfire and called 911 on her cellphone.
She said the dispatcher asked her why she was whispering and then the connection broke.
At a news conference last month, the county executive, Mark C. Poloncarz, said that the handling of the call was “completely unacceptable.” A transcript of the call has not been released.
The dispatcher was represented by the Civil Service Employees Association, a union for public employees in New York.
Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/04/nyregion/buffalo-shooting-911-dispatcher-fired.html
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