Missing teen Ohio girls found alive after 10+ years

[cartman]

Two girls that went missing in 2003 and 2004 have been found alive at the same house in Cleveland, OH. Very few details out at the moment, but this is reminiscent of the Jaycee Dugard case in California a few years ago.

Amanda Berry and Gina DeJesus Found Alive | FOX8.com

[cartman]

The guy who rescued the first girl and called 911 is soon to be an Internet legend. Heroes come in all forms.

[Groundhog]

Horrible thing, but wow, that guy... lol

[IlliniCub]

I hope he finds a new rib and salsa buddy

[JonInMiddleGA]

Not taking anything away from the serious/awful/tragic nature of this story but I'm sorry, but Charles is a trip. That's about as real as it gets right there.

[Groundhog]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

Not taking anything away from the serious/awful/tragic nature of this story but I'm sorry, but Charles is a trip. That's about as real as it gets right there.

It's almost like he's been preparing for that interview his whole life.

[EagleFan]

I knew something was wrong when a little pretty white girl ran into a black man's arms...

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

That's about as real as it gets right there.

No. That interview is the tip of the iceberg. His 9-1-1 call is as real as it gets:

Video: Charles Ramsey on how he helped Amanda Berry escape | cleveland.com

(Below and to the right of the video)

So real that they haven't even edited out his cell phone number or the MFs in the call at this juncture.

[mckerney]

[Ben E Lou]

In the 9-1-1 call, Ramsey says that the baby "looked Hispanic." Obviously not a shocker there, but it brings up an interesting note moving forward I suppose: assuming it turns out all three of these girls were raped, does the news stop reporting their names? (I recall that they did stop reporting the name of the male who was missing a long time and was found in the midwest a few years ago..maybe Missouri or Kansas?)

[Butter]

That guy should get free lifetime McDonald's right now.

[Easy Mac]

Not trying to belittle the story, but I enjoyed this snippet from the AP:

Berry disappeared at age 16 on April 21, 2003, when she called her sister to say she was getting a ride home from her job at a Burger King. DeJesus went missing at age 14 on her way home from school about a year later. They were found just a few miles from where they had gone missing.

Police said Knight went missing in 2002 and is 32 now. They didn't provide current ages for Berry or DeJesus.

[cuervo72]

Well we know they're not AP Math, anyway.

[Lathum]

At what time in the clip does he start talking about Rocky Marciano?

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by cuervo72

Well we know they're not AP Math, anyway.

{groan}

[cuervo72]

Thank you, I'll be here all week!

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Lathum

At what time in the clip does he start talking about Rocky Marciano?

Ha! I thought the exact same thing, especially with all the "rights" in the first part of the call.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

No. That interview is the tip of the iceberg. His 9-1-1 call is as real as it gets:

Okay, now I'm sure he's got to be related to deer-in-phone-booth guy.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

It takes a rare man that can make people forget about three kidnapped girls being found alive after a decade. Chuck Ramsey is that man. Bionic perm and all.

[korme]

So why are 2 of the 3 headline worthy? Why is Michelle Knight just a snippet in the story? I don't get it.

[Butter]

Originally Posted by korme

So why are 2 of the 3 headline worthy? Why is Michelle Knight just a snippet in the story? I don't get it.

Because she wasn't assumed missing. She was legally an adult when she was abducted, so I think it was just assumed that she picked up and moved somewhere without telling anyone.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by korme

So why are 2 of the 3 headline worthy? Why is Michelle Knight just a snippet in the story? I don't get it.

Police were not releasing details on the circumstances surrounding Knight’s disappearance.

+ this from a Plain Dealer sidebar story

Michelle Knight's grandmother, Deborah Knight, said in an interview Monday that, based on the recommendation of police and social workers, family members had concluded that Michelle likely left on her own because she was angry that her son was removed from her custody.

In other words, two of the names have been in the news in the area for almost a decade while the other seems to have remained relatively unknown.

[Ben E Lou]

Yeah...one of the Cleveland news sites I was reading had a story titled "Who Is Michelle Knight?"

[Desnudo]

Originally Posted by cartman

The guy who rescued the first girl and called 911 is soon to be an Internet legend. Heroes come in all forms.

"I look and I see this girl and she's just going nuts on the door so, I'm like, 'What's your problem? If you're stuck, just open the door.'

[Castlerock]

Did anyone listen to the recording of Amanda Berry's 911 call? She is clearly scared out of her mind and the operator couldn't get her off the phone fast enough.

Is that typical 911 dispatcher protocol? I have not listened to many 911 calls but the ones that I have heard seemed like the dispatcher would talk to the caller until help arrived.

[Karlifornia]

This story is weird.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Castlerock

Did anyone listen to the recording of Amanda Berry's 911 call? She is clearly scared out of her mind and the operator couldn't get her off the phone fast enough.

Is that typical 911 dispatcher protocol? I have not listened to many 911 calls but the ones that I have heard seemed like the dispatcher would talk to the caller until help arrived.

I found that pretty odd. I was under the impression that part of the reason for keeping a caller on the phone was to protect the officers coming to the scene. In other words, it's one thing if they're responding to a scene of a woman who escaped while her abductor was away, but it's quite another if they're responding to a scene of an abductor who has returned with a weapon. Keeping the caller on the phone would seem to be the fastest way to know if the situation has changed...

[albionmoonlight]

I worked on a case once where someone (successfully) sued a county 911 operation for gross negligence. (Actually a really sad case. A guy died who totally would have lived if the 911 folks had even been 50% of what they should have been).

My eyes were opened to the sometimes large gap between what the 911 policies actually are and the execution of them by the people actually manning the phones.

I am guessing that, much like funds for updating voting machines and flood levees, the funds for 911 operator training/compensation/review/etc. is something that keeps getting cut out of municipal budgets in favor of more visible spending. Then, when they are eventually needed, they are not there.

[GrantDawg]

The 911 guy was a jerk Ramsey as well. They need a big relearn there.

[Ben E Lou]

[Lathum]

I wish I had the savvy to do that. Awesome.

[Lathum]

Saldana was a 911 dispatcher for several years, I'll get him here to answer questions.

[DaddyTorgo]

Originally Posted by Lathum

Saldana was a 911 dispatcher for several years, I'll get him here to answer questions.

He's probably nursing the baby.

I mean...wait.

[tucker rocky]

[saldana]

so i listened to both callers and a couple things stood out for me:

during the call from Amanda Berry:
1. she was not in imminent danger
2. she was not injured in any way
3. she was able to tell the dispatcher exactly where she was, and give a full description of the suspect, including the fact that he was not there
4. the dispatcher had what is called "SE-911" equipment...because she called from a landline phone, the dispatcher instantly had her location pinpointed on a computerized map (the disp. knew that the call was coming from across the street from the address that Amanda gave)
5. there were other people that were NOT the actor/suspect with the caller/victim already

given those things, i dont have any issue with the dispatcher getting off the line. depending on the call volume at the answering point, she may have had no other choice but to hang up, and it very well may have been her policy to do so given the above points.

if it had been me, i would have tried to stay on the phone until units arrived, if for no other reason than it gives people a sense of safety and security, but it is not always possible to do that, so i think the dispatcher had to release the call and acted appropriately in doing so

during the call from Ramsey:

i am going to make an assumption here...since i believe that the answering point has SE-911 gear based on amanda's call, when Ramsey called and gave the same address, the second dispatcher saw that there was already an active call for that location in the CAD system (computer aided dispatch...usually goes hand in hand with SE-911 mapping systems)

so...
1. there was clearly no imminent danger...the caller was anecdotal for the first 10 seconds of the call talking about mcdonalds, etc
2. the dispatcher verified the address, confirming that it was a duplicate call
3. the dispatcher tried to get additional info, particularly about the need for EMS, and Ramsey didnt know anything except that he went to mcdonalds

at this point, Ramsey is useless...i will use an example that happens thousands of times per day across the country: there is a rear end collision MVA at an intersection of a two lane road, so only one direction of the road is blocked by the accident. every single person that passes in the opposite direction picks up their cell phone and calls 911...each call is answered and as soon as it is determined that:

1) the call is not a new accident, but is instead a duplicate, and
2) the caller has no new information (i.e. they didnt actually stop to see if anyone was hurt)

that call is disconnected...it is still logged and recorded, but it is actually a strain to the system to stay on the phone with those people, because if i am talking to him, i cant be answering another call that might be a NEW emergency somewhere else.

Ramsey really did save these girls by going to the house and finding them, but his 911 call is, in my professional opinion, useless....Amanda's call did everything it needed to, and i would have gotten rid of him as quickly as possible too.

[saldana]

Originally Posted by albionmoonlight

I worked on a case once where someone (successfully) sued a county 911 operation for gross negligence. (Actually a really sad case. A guy died who totally would have lived if the 911 folks had even been 50% of what they should have been).

My eyes were opened to the sometimes large gap between what the 911 policies actually are and the execution of them by the people actually manning the phones.

I am guessing that, much like funds for updating voting machines and flood levees, the funds for 911 operator training/compensation/review/etc. is something that keeps getting cut out of municipal budgets in favor of more visible spending. Then, when they are eventually needed, they are not there.

i can tell you that this is a pretty accurate statement...often, when people quit, they are never replaced because of the financial reasons, which stretches the remaining people very thin. there is also the issue of education and pay...i once had another dispatcher who was answering a police officer's request to check an out of state drivers license turn around and ask me if Georgia was really a state...unfortunately, 911 dispatching, much like being and EMT, Firefighter or Paramedic is a very demanding job that requires a decent level of intelligence to do well, but the pay is next to nothing, so it does not attract a "professional" level of persons to do it...my first job dispatching in 1996 paid less than $10/hour...guys i know that still do it today are making around $15/hour...you dont always get the highest caliber of individual for that amount of money.

[cartman]

Police on Berry Search: ‘We Had Our Hopes Up’ | FOX8.com

The police got a tip last year that one of the missing girls was buried in an empty lot in the neighborhood. One of the brothers that was arrested, called the search a "waste of money" in the news reports.

[saldana]

Originally Posted by Ben E Lou

I found that pretty odd. I was under the impression that part of the reason for keeping a caller on the phone was to protect the officers coming to the scene. In other words, it's one thing if they're responding to a scene of a woman who escaped while her abductor was away, but it's quite another if they're responding to a scene of an abductor who has returned with a weapon. Keeping the caller on the phone would seem to be the fastest way to know if the situation has changed...

this is correct...one thing that i didnt hear either one of the dispatchers say, which surprised me was "call back if anything changes"

again, you cant stay on the line with every caller, so when these two dispatchers determined that the situation was stable, they were, in my opinion, correct to release the callers, but the last thing that you should always do is give disconnect instructions just in case the scumbag does come back.

for my two cents, i think the first dispatcher should have stayed on the phone, but that is from a human standpoint...professionally, i think she acted appropriately.

[M GO BLUE!!!]

Useless in terms of helping the situation, but entertaining as hell for the internets!

[sterlingice]

I love having people from different walks of life on this board. Very cool, saldana. Someone should get her flowers for... ow!

SI

[JonInMiddleGA]

Found this one thanks to FB linkage from Black Stone Cherry

[chadritt]

I hope he gets royalties from these songs like the Bed Intruder guy did. He deserves it.

[tucker rocky]

[MrBug708]

"A few minutes ago Anderson Cooper asked if he would like a reward Charles pulled his paycheck out of his pocket and said "I get a Paycheck. Give the reward to the girls they rescued."

[GrantDawg]

I don't care if he doesn't want a reward. Someone give him some money for his entertainment value.

[Autumn]

His reality show will come soon enough.

[tucker rocky]

Originally Posted by Autumn

His reality show will come soon enough.

So who plays him in the movie?

A- Samuel L. Jackson
B- Eddie Murphy
C- other

[GrantDawg]

So, only the one suspect has been charged. He waived Miranda, and did talk. The girls said that in ten years, this was their first chance to escape. Wild.

[GrantDawg]

Ha! Ha! Stupid con-artist. Sylvia Browne: fans lash out at 'psychic' over false Ohio abduction prediction | World news | guardian.co.uk

[bhlloy]

It sure takes a special kind of scumbag to tell a mother her daughter is dead on TV when you know absolutely nothing of the sort