Blame in Pittsburgh

Our aim in posting this is not to cast a bad light on OEMC, but to point out that for the job to get done, all the pieces have to work together with minimal muss and fuss. This is not how to do it:

• The mother of a man charged with killing three Pittsburgh police officers told a 911 dispatcher he had weapons, but the dispatcher didn't relay that information to officers, the official in charge of county dispatchers says.

  The dispatcher should have asked more questions about the weapons, but didn't, and certainly should have told officers so they could take necessary precautions, Allegheny County Chief of Emergency Services Robert Full told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

  "There is no excuse. It could have been handled better, without a doubt," Full said in Tuesday's editions.

We know there's a list of questions call-takers are supposed to ask when a 911 call comes in. When we're lucky enough to have a PDT, we see where the data is entered, "No known weapons."

We also know that there are some horror stories out there about walking into a shit storm unaware of what's in the house. There are breakdowns and gaps and sometimes the info is unavailable. It happens. But complacency is the enemy of good police work. There are no "routine" calls just as there are no "routine" traffic stops. "Routine" gets people dead, time and time again.

Pittsburgh initially appears to be a breakdown of the highest order.