911 Operator Tells Teen To ‘Stop Whining’ Over Her Dying Dad, Dispatcher Loses Job

A Maryland 911 operator has been fired after telling a distraught teenage girl to “stop whining” when she called for help for Rick Warrick, her dying father. Anne Arundel County Fire department spokesman Capt. Russ Davies said the 911 dispatcher was no longer employed at the department after the investigation into the matter was concluded.

In a related report by the Inquisitr, Tim Conatser, the firefighter who posted photos of himself gunning down his dogs, resigned after receiving death threats.

Rick Warrick, his girlfriend Julia Pearce, his teen daughter, and her younger brother were stopped to fix a flat tire when Warrick and Pearce were both hit by car in a hit-and-run incident. Pearce suffered two broken legs, a broken pelvis, and a fractured skull, but was aware enough to urge the 13-year-old daughter to call 911 for help.

When the girl frantically asked the 911 operator to “please hurry up,” he asked her to stop yelling and asked for an exact location. The teenager responded they were currently along I-295, but the 911 operator pointed out that although the location was listed as a highway, it’s a “pretty long road.” What became instantly controversial was the choice of words when the 911 operator attempted to calm her down in order to narrow down the location.

“OK, let’s stop whining. OK, let’s stop whining. It’s hard to understand you … two people were struck, correct?” the 911 operator said.

Apparently, the 911 operator became frustrated and asked if there was anyone else he could speak to, but she said the only other person was her younger brother.

When the incident first occurred, the Anne Arundel County Fire Department admitted the 911 operator had used “a poor choice of words” but also defended his overall actions.

“However, what he was attempting to do was to get her attention, to start ascertaining information from her,” Davies said. “It was pretty clear at that point they didn’t know where they were … There could be a better choice of words.”

Now that the unnamed 911 dispatcher has been fired, Davies says telling the teenager to “stop whining” shouldn’t be a phrase used by a 911 operator.

“911 dispatchers are trained to take control when they have a hysterical caller to focus them, but how (the dispatcher) proceeded to do that doesn’t meet our expectations of how that would occur, and we’re going to presume the public feels the same way,” Davies said, according to NBC. “That’s not how they expect to be treated when calling 911 in an emergency like that.”