Boy of 9 calls 999 for drink of water

[vetteheadracer]

Nice to see the police doing what they do best.......

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_midlands/4176186.stm

....especially after the retrieving the little girls stuffed tiger from the M11 story a couple of weeks ago :rage:

[andy mac]

They didn't do anything...

[princeperch]

cant blame the old bill on this one. If they didnt respond to the call and later on it transpires the kid topped himself/got beaten to within an inch of his life by his parents/abused in some way/jumped out of his bedroom window and died etc etc, the police would be the ones in the sh1t.

The blame lies squarely at the feet of the parents for letting a 9 year old have access to a mobile, and if they didnt think it worked, they should have bothered to take the battery out of it or disable it or something, as most mobiles can make emergency calls "sim free".

[chim_knee]

Isn't nine a little old to not realise the implications of doing something like this? Is the kid a little slow - or is it normal?

I don't have kids myself and I seem to remember skipping ages 7-10 myself.

[silverback mike]

It all depends on the nature and tone of the call. A 9 year old that was saying he wanted a drink of water could unravel all sorts of things. I doubt whether officers 'swooped' on the house, but knocked on the door to check said 9 year old was in order and not abused.

I have attended similar jobs. A lot of these calls can be dealt with by the skill and gut instinct of the call takers. Personally I wouldn't have a problem attending and checking the welfare of the child.

[jasandjules]

Well, better the police checked and it was a kid p****ed off with his parents than one locked up without food/drink as punishment for a day or something..