Inquiry launched amid concern over dropped 999 calls

AN Garda Síochána has launched an inquiry into 19,000 emergency calls after two ‘incidents of particular concern’ were identified, as Justice Minister Heather Humphreys said she’s concerned over the cancellation of 999 calls by officers.

Garda Commissioner Drew Harris yesterday confirmed that thousands of calls were being examined after it was previously revealed through an internal review that more than 200,000 calls had been cancelled over almost two years in 2019 and 2020.

Procedures were put in place last year to address the issue, including classifying certain calls as ‘intelligence’. The examination is now being carried out on the calls in this intelligence category after an initial review revealed two concerning incidents.

Mr Harris said that not all of the intelligence calls were made to 999 and that the number included some calls to Garda stations and command and control centres.

The Garda Commissioner said the calls are not just confined to domestic abuse or vulnerability issues.

He said that it was ‘too early to say’ if it was a service failure and later added that the forces would examine its processes again to make sure they’re ‘taking in room for human error’.

‘There are incidents in there which are serious crime, but we want to examine those at a divisional level in terms of “was there an investigation, is there another Pulse incident which dealt with those crimes?”’ he told reporters at Garda Headquarters in Dublin yesterday.

He added: ‘Two incidents, in particular, are of concern that we’ve informed the Policing Authority of, so we will have a quick understanding of what those are, but we have, in effect, this whole tranche of incidents to examine.’