THE CANADIAN PRESS
PRINCE ALBERT, Sask. - Frustration and stress boiled over for one student on a 911 call last year, and landed him in provincial court.
After his bus home from school was held up by police doing traffic control, the 17-year-old youth boy got home and planned to curse out police chief Dale McFee, court was told.
He didn't know the civilian number, so instead phoned 911 and when the receptionist couldn't transfer him to the police chief, he swore at the receptionist instead.
Except phoning 911 for any reason other than to report an emergency is illegal.
The youth pleaded guilty in provincial court on Wednesday for that charge, as well as another one for missing his initial court date.
His ride to court had the flu, his mother said, and nobody else could give him a ride.
He was fined $200 for the phone call, another $80 for missing the court date.
"I'm sorry. It won't happen again," he said before his sentencing.
The offence carried with it a maximum penalty of $2,000, however, the lesser amount was given because he is a youth, and because of the significant amount of stress he was under at the time.
While this was an extreme case, Staff Sgt. Bill Chow said there are many other examples of people phoning 911 for inappropriate reasons, though he didn't have specific stats.
He said most inappropriate calls to 911 are either accidents, sometimes caused by children, or non-emergency police calls that are better directed to the civilian number.
Chow said many people don't understand that when police are needed for non-emergency situations like a rowdy party, it's best not to call 911.
He said the 911 system is intended for emergency, life threatening situations.
"When people misuse the system, basically what they're doing is, for a lack of a better term, jamming it up, so a person who may be in need of immediate police assistance is unable to get through," said Chow.
Most of those people just get a warning, said Chow, but repeated or flagrant abuse will see charges laid.
