911 call on Arrowhead attack on hold for 4 minutes, not 15, KC says. Is it still too long?

Any amount of time longer than 60 seconds to wait for a 911 operator to answer a call is concerning, said the wife of a man who was brutally attacked Saturday in Kansas City.

Johnathan Scaletty, 34, and his wife, Brandi Scaletty, of Lee’s Summit, said they were on hold for what seemed like 15 minutes Saturday evening after Johnathan said he was badly injured in the parking lot outside GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium ahead of a Luke Combs concert.

Kansas City police on late Monday said the wait lasted four minutes, according to their records.

It was confirmed the victims did wait about an hour about for an ambulance to arrive, according to a timeline provided by Capt. Corey Carlisle, a spokesman for the Kansas City Police Department.

The couple said they were randomly attacked by a group of strangers that approached their car as they waited out a burst of rain. When he called 911 on his wife’s phone after the attack, Johnathan estimated he was on hold for about 15 minutes.

Police on Tuesday said their records reflect that the call was held in the 911 queue for just over four minutes before being transferred to a call taker, Carlisle said.

The call was then transferred to the police department a couple minutes later. About nine minutes after the call was initiated, officers were dispatched, Carlisle said. An off-duty officer working at Arrowhead arrived about four minutes later, according to the timeline provided by police.

While firefighters arrived about 10 minutes after police, the ambulance didn’t arrive until 60 minutes after Scaletty initially dialed 911, according to Kansas City police.

Data from the Mid-America Regional Council verified the police department’s account that the call was in the 911 queue for over 4 minutes. The total duration of the call was just over 7 minutes.

Brandi Scaletty on Tuesday said that even with the chaos happening in the moment, she’s sure it was longer than four minutes. But even if it was only four minutes, she said, that was much longer than she believes she and her husband should have been made to wait.

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For the past several years, Kansas City police have failed to meet the National Emergency Number Association call answering standards of 90% of calls answered within 15 seconds and 95% answered within 20 seconds, according to data from the Mid-America Regional Council’s Regional Ringtime Range.

In 2022, 65.47% of calls were answered within 15 seconds and 86.68% of calls answered within 20 seconds. Last month, only 40.76% of the calls were answered in 15 seconds and 45.05% of the calls within 20 seconds.

It shouldn’t have taken longer than 60 seconds to get through to someone who could summon help, Brandi Scaletty said, especially considering the severity of her husband’s injuries.

Johnathan Scaletty suffered multiple breaks in his left ankle, as well as trauma to his neck and face, and multiple abrasions across his body.

On Tuesday morning he saw an orthopedic surgeon who reset his foot for the third time since Saturday evening. Brandi Scaletty said doctors are waiting for the swelling in his foot to go down before they can operate.

Brandi Scaletty said she is still desperate for answers about who did this and whether they will be arrested. No information on possible suspects has been released.

The Star requested a copy of the incident report. Kansas City police said that as of Tuesday, it was not yet ready.

‘Four minutes is unacceptable’

Mayor Quinton Lucas said on Tuesday that the wait people are experiencing when they call 911 is unacceptable.

“It think that it’s something where we need change almost immediately,” he said.

He plans to bring up two options at the next Board of Police Commissioners meeting in two weeks that could help avoid the initial delays.

Those options include using technology or an answering service that tells callers they reached 911 and then has them select whether they need police, fire or EMS.

The other option is to continue to work with the police department where a lot of the calls start. They could have conversations about whether the city looks at shifting the first intake of 911 calls away from the police department to the fire department or another service by the city, Lucas said.

It’s important to recognize that the city has surpassed what is the industry standard and it needs to be fixed, he said.

Last week, KCUR reported that nearly one-quarter of the police department’s 96 call taker positions are unfilled.

“I think it’s not only a life or death issue, but it’s one that merits more attention from us than just lamenting how difficult it is to hire people right now,” Lucas said. “We need to get beyond that problem.”

Lucas said he didn’t know all the facts surrounding Saturday’s emergency, but said the “answer is not that it was four rather than a lengthier time.”

“Four minutes is unacceptable,” he said.

People of Kansas City need to have the confidence that if they call 911 it will be answered by someone quickly and efficiently, he said.

“This is a crisis right now in Kansas City,” Lucas said. “It’s a crisis that needs to change immediately.”