Jocelyn Winfrey.
A jury may ultimately decide whether New Haven’s 911 crew mishandled calls about ferocious dogs mauling Jocelyn Winfrey — and cost Winfrey her life.
Winfrey’s estate has filed suit in Superior Court against the city and employees of its 911 Public Service Answering Point (PSAP) center seeking monetary damages for what it characterizes as fatal negligence.
Two American bull mixes attacked Winfrey in the fenced-in Ella Grasso Boulevard driveway of a Yale psychiatric intern whom she was accompanying on June 20, 2016. She lost her leg and eyes in the attack and, soon after, her life. She was 53 years old.
The attack prompted local legislators to research and put together a proposed change to New Haven’s animal ordinance; they previewed the proposal last week.
Meanwhile, the handling of the 911 calls by the city’s PSAP center also provoked public outrage, leading to a new city protocol for handling calls about dog attacks. (Read about that here.)
The new lawsuit, filed on June 15 by estate administrator Janet Bogan, notes that a PSAP worker coded the call as a low priority after hanging on up on the first witness caller. It notes that a second call came in seven minutes later with specific information about the dangers — and after 11 minutes, still no police had been dispatched to the scene while the dogs tore Winfrey’s flesh to the bone.
An AMR ambulance company caller then asked a PSAP worker to dispatch the cops immediately. The worker responded that she read the call wrong, and that she would do her best, “but still did not dispatch the police or fire department with any urgency,” the complaint reads. She instead placed a call to a police officer “and spent several more minutes laughing and joking rather than dispatching [the officer] to the scene who apparently had time to get to the call and was available.
“It was only after laughing and joking, and over 15 minutes had passed that police officers and/or fire rescue were dispatched to the scene.”
You can listen to the 911 calls yourself in the audio file at the top of this story.
The complaint calls the response delay “unreasonable and unnecessary” as well as a breach of duty.
The complaint argues that supervisors “knew or should have known” about the mishandling of the calls. “Joyclen WInfrey was ultimately killed” because of the PSAP crew’s misconduct, the suit alleges.
The suit seeks monetary compensation for Winfrey’s “medical treatment costs, funeral expenses, hospital costs, and other treatment costs,” for her “death and loss of capacity to carry on and enjoy life’s activities,” her “loss of income” and “earning capacity,” for “pain and suffering” and physical disfigurement, along with punitive damages and court and attorney’s fees.
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Pirate, one of the attacking dogs.
Mayoral spokesman Laurence Grotheer said the city as a practice does not comment on pending lawsuits.
At the time of the incident, city emergency management chief Rick Fontana defended PSAP’s handling of the incident. He cautioned against jumping to judgment based on the recording. He said he listened to the recording ten times, and concluded the dispatcher acted according to her training: “When you really look at it, when you listen to it, that disapatcher only heard it that one time, looked at the dispatch protocol; she followed the appropriate protocol.”
Fontana said the caller had no firsthand information. Protocol requires sending a fire crew if an animal-bite victim “is bleeding from a critical body part. They would be head, neck, face.” Jocelyn Winfrey was indeed bleeding in all those places; witnesses said buckets of blood were all over the place, and her legs had only bone, no skin. But the caller, Fontana noted, didn’t mention any of that.
The first call lasted one minute and 30 minutes. The caller gave the address and reported from the outset that dogs were “attacking” a woman. The conversation continued:
“What’s going on?”
“Humans are being attacked by a dog.”
“OK. There’s people being attacked by a dog?”
“Yes.”
“Where is the dog, outside?”
“No, they’re in the fenced-in yard. I can’t see. But I hear the lady screaming and the dog barking.”
“OK, but did the dog bite her?”
“Yes, the dog is biting her now.”
“Where is the owner of the dog, do you know?”
“No.”
“OK, where is the lady? Is she still in the backyard?”
“She’s, yup, in the yard with the dog.”
“Do you know if she is bleeding anywhere? Is she injured?”
“I can’t … I’m outside the gate. Can’t you have somebody get here as soon as possible?”
“Ma’am, the reason why I’m asking is there is a different priority. I need to know if she is bitten … If she’s bleeding …”
“… the dog is attacking! I’m sure. … I just hear …”
“So you’re not there with the female.”
“They’re over there trying … no, I’m across the street. The boys are over there trying to distract the dog.”
“OK. Thank you.”