Detroit dispatcher sentenced

Not sure if I agree with probation only, I think there was no excuse for this.

DETROIT - A 911 operator who authorities say didn't take seriously a
boy's calls to report that his mother had collapsed was sentenced
Tuesday to serve a year of probation for willful neglect of duty. The
mother was found dead three hours after the call, taken by Sharon
Nichols.
District Judge Paula Humphries on Tuesday also sentenced Nichols, 45, to
perform 15 days of community service. Humphries could have given the
woman a year in jail for the misdemeanor but noted that she had no
previous criminal record.
"I don't think that a jail sentence is appropriate at all," Humphries
said.
Nichols had testified at trial that she could not hear the boy, then 5
years old. Authorities say Robert Turner called 911 in Detroit twice on
Feb. 20, 2006, to report that Sherrill Turner, 46, had passed out.
Nichols, who was fired from her job as a 911 operator in July 2006,
declined a chance to speak at the sentencing. Wright Blake, a lawyer for
Nichols, told the court: "She has lived her whole life being a lawful,
law-abiding citizen."
Prosecutor Lora Weingarden had asked Humphries for probation and
community service, not jail time.
"I think the sentencing was fair," Weingarden said afterward. "When
she's not serving as a 911 operator she's not a danger to anybody."
Charges were dismissed earlier against Terri Sutton, an operator who
took a second call from the boy. In January, Humphries said that Sutton
might have been rude but that there was no evidence of willful neglect.
Sutton declined to comment at Tuesday's sentencing, where she sat with
some other supporters of Nichols and held hands with them as the judge
considered the sentence.
Sutton still works for the city, but not as a 911 operator, the police
department said.
The boy, now 7, testified in January that Nichols had hung up on him and
accused him of playing games. Sutton was accused of ignoring protocol by
requesting police instead of emergency workers.
Robert and his family didn't attend the sentencing. Lawsuits filed on
their behalf are pending.