lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/2021/10/911-operator-hung-up-on-spanish-speaking-caller-in-deadly-lehigh-valley-fire-lawsuit-alleges.html

911 operator hung up on Spanish-speaking caller in deadly Lehigh Valley fire, lawsuit alleges

Tasked with directing emergency phone calls where lives can be at stake, Lehigh County’s 911 center was a hub of racism and negligence that put callers and emergency personnel in danger, sometimes with deadly results, a new federal lawsuit alleges.

A Spanish-speaking man who called 911 to report his Allentown home was on fire was hung up on by a Lehigh County 911 dispatcher, the lawsuit alleges. The caller and his 14-year-old nephew died in the house blaze.

Seven now-former 911 dispatchers are suing Lehigh County, County Executive Phil Armstrong and six other current or former county officials, alleging their First Amendment and other constitutional rights were violated after they publicly aired the issues at the call center.

Calls for comment about the lawsuit, filed Wednesday in federal court, were referred to Lehigh County Solicitor Thomas Caffrey. He declined immediate comment because he not read the suit.

Attorney Fredrick E. Charles filed the suit on behalf of the seven plaintiffs. He could not be reached immediately for comment.

Plaintiffs Justin Zucal, David Gatens, Francis Gatens, John Kirchner, Emily Geiger, Julie Landis and Brandi DeLong Palmer are seeking reinstatement to their jobs, back pay, compensatory damages as well as damages for emotional distress, pain and suffering.

The lawsuit paints a damning picture of the call center, where Spanish-speaking callers were denied help and calls went unanswered when some operators slept on the job or played the beanbag-toss-game cornhole during work shifts.

The plaintiffs allege some white 911 dispatchers openly said they “do not like taking calls from Spanish people” and refused to use a call translation service to help with Spanish-speaking callers.

Certain dispatchers forced non-English speaking callers to communicate in English or be denied emergency assistance, according to the suit.

The 911 center’s “hostile environment” to minority and Spanish-speaking callers included the deadly Allentown house fire, according to the lawsuit.

Heriberto Santiago Jr. spoke Spanish when he dialed 911 on July 27, 2020, to report a fire in his home at 739 Fair St. in the city.

The lawsuit contends a county 911 dispatcher indicated she did not understand Spanish, told Santiago to speak English and then hung up on him.

Santiago and his nephew Andres Javier Ortiz died in the fire.

Some dispatchers and trainees slept during shifts or spent time on their cellphones or social media, leading to “countless calls” involving life-threatening emergencies going unanswered or sent to other dispatchers, the suit claims.

A dispatcher watched fireworks from the roof of the building in July 2020, and missed calls for emergency relief concerning reports of gunfire at that time in Lehigh County, the lawsuit says.

A center supervisor allegedly watched soap operas and other programs on a personal computer, sold cosmetics and used personal devices during work.

The plaintiffs allege one employee assaulted a co-worker, and that other coworkers transported and possessed weapons in the 911 call center.

One of the operators whose conduct is cited in the lawsuit works on a freelance basis for lehighvalleylive.com and The Express-Times, which is not naming the operators discussed in the suit because they are not defendants.

The former operators say they and other coworkers raised numerous issues about Allentown’s digital radio system that made it not fully functional, and put callers and first responders at risk.

Issues included calls that appeared to be received at the 911 center when they were not, and “numerous” police traffic stops and pursuit transmissions not being received, according to the suit.

Zucal and others raised concerns about fire calls, including 911 operators not monitoring channels used for working fires.

In some instances, the suit says, operators dispatched fire-related assistance calls to police before alerting fire or EMS crews. The lag between notifying police and then fire crews was as long as four minutes after calls for police assistance, the suit said.

Town halls were held on Aug. 26 and Dec. 10, 2019, to address the issues and concerns with county supervisors and the administration, including the defendants.

But county officials “neglected, ignored and refused to respond” to any of the complaints, according to court papers.

Instead, the dispatchers allege county officials planned to retaliate against them and terminate them from their jobs.

The suit says a center supervisor received permission from the former county director of emergency services for 911 center workers to share a small New Year’s Eve toast with a “coquito” eggnog mix, which contains alcohol, in 2019.
The same drink was given as gifts to participants in a “Secret Santa” Christmas party held during working hours on county property, the suit alleges.

But county disciplinary procedures says an employee can be immediately dismissed from their job for the “use, possession, sale or distribution of alcoholic beverages and/or illegal or unauthorized d**** during working hours,” court records say.

In January 2020, the plaintiffs say they were told they were being terminated for participating in the New Year’s Eve toast. The suit says the dispatchers were told they could resign as opposed to being terminated, which would “reflect positively” on them, and they could immediately re-apply for reinstatement.

Reminds me of that one dispatcher who caught an attitude against a distressed girl and hung up

S*** is so crazy policing in this country is baffling its just a social club at this point

This s*** disgusting f*** all them niggas

B**** if you don’t speak the s*** learn or find a new job this s*** ain’t a game

Not even remotely surprising tbh

Hope they rot in prision

Most dispatches have a Spanish speaking call group. It takes 0 effort to transfer a call.

This make it even worse

How does it make it worse

If you can’t speak Spanish at least you get transferred to someone who can.

The better option is to be hung up on?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lehigh_Valley#Demographics

Hispanics and Latinos of any race made up 11.3% of the population. Hispanics of any race made up the fastest growing demographic in the Lehigh Valley. Lehigh County is in the top 1% of all U.S. counties for inward migration from international locations, according to a Select USA, a program of the U.S. Commerce Department.8 The Lehigh Valley as a whole also leads the state of Pennsylvania in terms of population growth in the 18-to-34 year old demographic, according to 2020 Census data.

this is a disgrace, it's a f***ing immigrant community and you can't get bilingual 911 operators?

I’m not defending what’s going on in OP lmao

All I did was give an option that’s better than hanging up on people

oh yeah i forgot, you can still openly discriminate against latin immigrants and you don't have to hide it as much, its still somewhat socially acceptable in american culture

latinos are subjugated by their own community (on terms of reactionary nationalism and colonialist racism, especially for darker-skinned people) and subjugated by america at the same time for similiar reasons

it's like x2

oh i know, i just wanted to pull up stats, they have no excuse for this negligence

What the actual f***?? Bro, each emergency dispatch service in Canada has a bilingual dept (En & Fr), and they have trained translators on hand for Chinese (Mandarin & Cantonese) and Punjabi/Hindi/Urdu (for Indian-Pakistani people).

This is f***ing nasty & shows how divided the U.S really is.

Look I cannot speak for Moka but I think what Moka is trying to say is that the fact these people could've been transferred to to Spanish speaking operators instead of being hung up on makes this situation even worse.

It’s worse that they were hanging up on them if they could’ve just transferred the call

Preciate you bro

ok I just misunderstood you

my bad

Nah you good its understandable why you got passionate about it, 2 niggas are dead behind the s***, and one was just a kid

I used to help work in dispatch for a public utility and that's how we operated. We had a specific extension that would forward to a Spanish speaking hunt group that had 4 people working it.

Yeah so you know better than anybody this s*** ain’t have to happen

Yikes

That's disgusting.

yeah they deserve jail time for that bullshit