Indiana 911 Opearator Fired After Caller Dies from Heart Attack

An Indiana 9-1-1 operator has been fired over the handling of an emergency call by a transit police officer who had suffered a fatal heart attack in Gary, Ind. earlier this month.

Burt Sanders, 44, was found dead inside a church where he was volunteering on June 6 — seven hour after he called for help.

Paramedics responded around 2 a.m. to Gary's Church of God in Christ, where Sanders, a church member, was spending the night.

“I need an ambulance real quick, I'm having chest pains,” Sanders told a 9-1-1 operator who was based at the Gary police station.

When the operator asked Sanders, a 44-year-old transit police officer, if he wanted to stay on the line, he did not respond. Minutes later, an ambulance arrived at the church. But paramedics couldn't get in.

A radio dispatcher gave the paramedics permission to leave.

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