Sep 28 2008
SNL On Palin
Only one comment on the SNL skit (if you must have a link go here): I am so glad I graduated from the 3rd grade! Â So, ferenners work in the UN? Wow, us poor old rubes in Amerika would never have figured that out without the Einsteins in TV land. Entertainers have such simple minds, like those of a dog giving itself a good scratch, oblivious to the world around them.
Absolutely loved the Bill Clinton sketch, though.
This is off topic, but thought it deserved some attention. It appears that Monegan released private information of a victim who was the wife of the recently retired Alaska commissioner of public safety back in 2002 when he was murdered.
Not only that, but the 911 Dispatchers took over 40 minutes to get to the retired Alaska commissioner of public safety’s house while his wife nearly bled to death.
Only months after he resigned as Alaska’s commissioner of public safety, Godfrey was shot and killed in his home. Police said the killer was his ex-lover, Karen Brand, who also shot and wounded Patti Godfrey before turning the gun on herself and committing suicide.
When Patti Godfrey ignored the threats of her assailant and dialed 911 early in the morning of Aug. 3, Anchorage police instantly had ample information to quickly find her home and get help for the gunshot wounds that were draining away her life.
And Godfrey, from a prominent law enforcement family, had every confidence that she would soon be rescued.
TX: ”You know, here I am, I can smell blood, and it’s bubbling, and I’m thinking, ‘I need help, and I need it now,’ ” she recalled in a recent interview. ”You’re raised with it — 9-1-1, and they’re there.
”And it didn’t happen.”
Anchorage Police Department dispatcher Billy Miller, a two-year employee on call-taking duties, picked Patti’s call out of a queue on his computer screen and answered at 12:29:56 a.m.
”911, what’s the emergency?”
”I’ve been shot, please.”
”OK. . .”
”I’m bleeding to death.”
”. . . who shot you ma’am.”
”Karen Brand. Hurry it up.”
”Where’s she at now?”
”I’m losing blood.”
LOCATION: 22953 EAGLE RIVER RD #GLACIER PHONE:NUMBER WAS PUBLISHED COMP:GODFREY GLENN G.
That night, believing that police must be massing around the Godfreys’, the Vandervalks decided to warn the Godfreys’ next-door neighbors to the east, the Brocks, who were friends from their days in the Air Force. Amy Vandervalk told them a police crisis team should be there soon if it wasn’t already. She offered their house in case the Brocks were evacuated should there be an armed standoff.
The Brocks called back to say that no police were around the Godfrey house. The police cars were congregated within sight still farther up the road, at the eastern junction of Eagle Glacier Loop and Eagle River Road, they said. Vandervalk got dressed and checked the outside of his own house for anything suspicious. On his police car radio, he heard officers frantically starting to sort out where the house was.
”Are you looking for the Godfrey address?” he radioed in.
”That’s affirm,” the dispatcher replied.
He drove his APD-issue Ford Crown Victoria to where the police had set up a staging area, told them he knew the Godfrey house, and popped open the doors and trunk. Sgt. Shell and other officers armed with long guns piled in.
”Everyone is sitting in the trunk, hanging out the doors. The doors wouldn’t even close,” Vandervalk said.
Even as Vandervalk was weaving in out and out of parked cruisers to bring officers to the house, luck was finally turning in other ways, too. A deputy director of the troopers who knew where the Godfreys lived was being raced up Eagle River Road in another APD car. An Anchorage Fire Department dispatcher, using the newer dispatch system available at their center, faxed a computer-generated map to police showing the precise location of the house. An APD dispatcher called the 24-hour MTA operations center and also got the correct address, according to an MTA log.
Vandervalk asked the Brocks to turn on their outside lights to guide him. He dropped the police off at their driveway. The 911 operator told Godfrey to scream so the officers would know where she was. The officers walked quietly through the dark woods, then broke in through the garage.
The first police officers got to Patti Godfrey at 1:18 a.m.
From the OVR Final Godfrey Report
Patricia Godfrey’s Complaint
Patricia Godfrey has filed a written complaint with the OVR regarding the response by APD to her home after her husband Glenn Godfrey Sr. was murdered and she was shot four times and seriously wounded by Karen Brand who then committed suicide. The primary issue raised by the complaint is the delay in
providing immediate medical assistance to Mrs. Godfrey.
The second basis for her complaint regards release of confidential information relating to her home address and telephone number, as well as her daughter’s home telephone number, in the E-911 tape and transcript released by APD to the media at a press conference on August 22, 2002.
Finding Number 1
Release Of Confidential Information By The Anchorage Police Department Violated Victims’ Rights
The Anchorage Police Department violated both Patricia Godfrey and her daughter’s statutory right of confidentiality when they improperly released private information, her home address and telephone number, and her daughter’s home telephone number. This violation occurred during a press conference held in the Chief’s conference room at APD on August 22, 2002. Both Mrs. Godfrey and her daughter are considered victims as that term is defined in AS 12.55.185(16). AS 12.61.110 provides for confidentiality regarding the location of a crime victim’s residence address and telephone numbers.
Anchorage Police Department Budget Problems-No Accountability
As part of the establishment and maintenance of the E-911 system, the Municipality assesses a “surcharge of $0.50 cents per month per local access line and for each wireless telephone number that is billed or sold to a customer with an address within the Municipality†AMC 26.65.050. According to the Municipal Code, the surcharge is “collected to fund the enhanced 911 system [and] shall be reviewed annually to determine whether the level of surcharge is adequate,
excessive or insufficient to meet the anticipated enhanced 911 system needs.†AMC 26.65.050. The annual review of the E-911 surcharge is required to be conducted by the chief of police and the office of management and budget. AMC 26.65.075. The review of the “revenues generated from the surcharge and the
expenses incurred for operation, maintenance, and upgrade of the enhanced 911 system†is for the purpose of “determin[ing] whether the level of surcharge is adequate, excessive or insufficient to meet the enhanced E-911 system needs.†AMC 26.65.075.
“Chief Walter Monegan testified he has not done such a review in the year and a half that he has held the position of Chief. [Monegan Depo 7]. Nor was the Municipality able to produce any such report ever prepared by APD or the Municipal Office of Management and Budget.”
It is a cause of concern that there is no report to show where the surcharge revenue goes or what it is spent on, especially because the State Legislature recently broadened the E-911 surcharge to allow collection of the 50-cent surcharge on wireless phones. This will result in even greater revenue flowing to the Municipality with no way for the public to determine where the money goes.
In October, APD proposed another bond measure to the Assembly that, if approved, will ask the voters for another $1,750,000 to add to the E-911 project. [Mew Depo 11]. Deputy Chief Mark Mew summarized the situation stating, “It’s
a massive project. And it’s one that we have known for some time that we needed to doâ€. [Mew Depo 11] Mew testified that he had hoped to use the revenues collected from the 50-cent wireless surcharge towards the E-911 system upgrade. Due to budget problems in city government, the surcharge revenues are now directed towards offsetting the dispatch unit’s operating budget instead of towards a system upgrade. [Mew Depo 79].
Same recruitment issues in Anchorage
Finding Number 5
The Shortage Of Employees In The Dispatch Unit Contributed To The Delayed Response In The Godfrey Incident
The dispatch unit is authorized to employ 56 non-sworn employees and one sworn supervisor. The last time dispatch was at near to full staffing levels was in 1999. In 2001, dispatchers worked over 13,000 hours of overtime, much of it
ordered due to lack of personnel. [BATES 222]. The dispatch center was in critical condition. In an internal APD memorandum from the Director of Employee Relations, David Otto, to Chief Monegan dated August 31, 2001, Otto explained that the understaffing “has caused a very evident decline in morale, the result of being held over or ordered in early for a shift on a regular basis, or ordered to work on one’s days off. It has also had a severe impact on employees’ families and lifestyles. More employees are using sick leave due to exhaustion and stress-related causes. Others are openly discussing or actively seeking employment elsewhere where more predictable hours are the norm.†[BATES 204].
On September 13, 2002 Lieutenant Miller was informed that, effective September 16, she would be transferred back to the patrol division. Chief Monegan replaced Lieutenant Miller with Lieutenant Stephen Smith. He explained that while the decision to move Miller out of dispatch was not directly related to the Godfrey response, he was “getting frustrated with the pace … of her making the transition. … Steve [Smith] was a better tool to get it done quicker than Kris was.†[Monegan Depo 12]. Lieutenant Miller had headed up the dispatch unit for roughly a year.
So it was okay for Monegan to reassign a staff member because he was “getting frustrated with the pace of her making the transition”, but not for Palin when all of the same above problems were evident due to Monegan’s performance.
SBD
Another interesting item was the author of the report, Stephen Branchflower, Victims’ Rights Advocate.
Sound familiar!!
SBD