And from way out in left field
The thing that always bugs me when I listen to that tape is the stupid dispatcher! Geeeze! STFU already! You do not have to repeat every single word of every goddamn transmission that comes across your channel! You're on a repeater. Everyone heard it the first time!
I beg your pardon, but apparently you're clueless about with the way the LAPD communications system is set up, and was set up at the time. So allow me to clue you in just a little.
"Everyone"
did not "hear it the first time," only the units on the North Hollywood frequency, which in 1997 typically deployed nine patrol units on weekday mornings. As soon as the help-calls started coming in, which she appropriately broadcast on dispatch frequencies citywide, units began responding from all over the valley and throughout the city, and from allied agencies too. She was, again appropriately, multicasting the messages on those frequencies because
none of the incoming officers from outside the valley had the North Hollywood frequency in their radios, and they could not hear anything that was going on. Multi-patching of mobile frequencies - which would theoretically have allowed "everyone to hear it the first time" - didn't become available until the new dispatch centers and consoles went into service in 2002. In an ideal world it would probably have been best to have everyone switch to a citywide tactical frequency, and on at least one occasion you can hear a request for that, and it seems to me that Tac 5 was assigned, but the shooting and radio traffic was so intense and non-stop that everyone recognized that there was no way the dozens (and eventually hundreds) of officers should take a time out and mess with their radios.
STFU and let the officers talk!
On the LAPD radios, the dispatchers (RTOs - Radiotelephone Operators) don't need to "STFU" (your command of the language is most impressive) in order to hear the officers talk. The system is half-duplex, with the dispatchers continuously receiving the uplink side, so they can hear their units even when THEY are broadcasting. We quickly become quite adept at listening and talking simultaneously.
In addition, during the incident there were outside-division officers on scene transmitting emergency messages, and THEIR dispatchers were, appropriately, broadcasting them. If you listen closely you'll hear a number of different dispatchers' and supervisors' voices from time to time.
The communications supervisor should have yanked her out of that seat fast enough to give her whiplash.
The fact is that shortly after the incident began, one of the supervising dispatchers
specifically pulled Ms Bellard, (because of her already well-known skill and unflappable calmness) off the 9-1-1 phone board (her assignment that day) to assist the less-experienced operator who was dispatching on the frequency when it started. As it continued to escalate with multiple help calls and officers down, she did the majority of the broadcasting, while the original operator handled much of the radio-log. The CAD system was totally inadequate to keep up with the unprecedented amount of radio traffic, so everything was written on the back-up manual radio message logs, to be input to the CAD later.
Throughout the four hours that RTO Bellard stayed at the console without taking even a brief break, there were, of course, a number of supervisory personnel, both sworn and civilian, standing around her, assisting or at least observing, I didn't once hear any suggestion that she be replaced by anyone. It was an unforseen incident, and one for which there really were no established procedures beyond the routine response to "officer needs help" and "officer shot" and "tactical alert" situations, but she and her coworkers and immediate supervisors adapted to the changing circumstances.
Dispatchers typically don't get a lot of recognition for the work they do, but the officers out there involved in the shootout took note of their performance, and shortly afterwards the six operators most involved were invited by the incident commander (Lt Zingo, "15L10" whom you can hear repeatedly on the recording) to North Hollywood station for a formal "thank you" ceremony, saying "Too often we overlook the civilian employees in the department. We wanted to let the PSRs know we were thankful for what they did."
Several of the officers who had been shot made it there too, and one told them and his fellow officers "I broke down when I was explaining how I felt about the RTOs. I was really grateful to them. It was wonderful to put a face and name to the voice. A lot of time officers take the RTOs for granted, but that's something I'll never do, because of this incident."
The commanding officer of Operations Valley Bureau, in which North Hollywood is located, said "Despite the many communications challenges, the RTOs performed exceedingly well. "It showed in their professionalism and in the manner in which they were able to remain calm and keep people calm on the other end of the radio."
So I'm awfully sorry it "always bugs" you, and that you think the dispatcher whom you don't know from Adam is "stupid," and YOU think she should have been "yanked out of her seat" (to be replaced by whom?? I'd been there over 25 years and probably couldn't have done as well as she did). But then, the people whose opinion actually mattered - and whose lives were in the balance - thought and to this day think otherwise.
Now
I'll STFU. Maybe.
