Lawsuit: Paramedics waited outside while man had fatal heart attack, because Seattle Police had flagged the address as 'dangerous' when a previous tenant lived there
His family’s lawsuit filed against Seattle has been settled for over $1.8 million.
If cops are going to maintain a database of 'dangerous' addresses, and tell paramedics not to respond without a police escort, the police department must also ☆maintain☆ the database.
They did not.
The family got a $1,860,000 settlement, but should've gotten more.
If you read the article, the family got everything they wanted from the lawsuit. $1.8 million, and the police department rehauled their blacklist protocol. Blacklisted addresses expire after one year, and they're verified every time emergency responders are dispatched to one of them. I wonder why similar precautions weren't in place before, although I can see how something like this can get overlooked until something bad happens and consequences occur. We should demand better, though.
What happened was tragic, but it's great that the lawsuit had the best outcome for everyone involved.
I live in not-America at the moment and let be the first to say Americans give way more thought to prevention and do-it-right-the-first-time than most anybody else.
We sure should. The only lives that seem to matter to them are other cops. All other precautions seem to exist only because someone forced them upon them.