I think if I were the shooter, I would be a little concerned about what is not on that tape. Such as, a loud warning to the burgler that he should leave imediately.

"I shot the man."

:D

Not to worry. Evidence gets 'lost' all the time. Especially exonerating evidence.

One interesting fact in the recording: when the woman calls and says someone is breaking in, the dispatcher eventually says someone is on the way. However, once her husband has shot the guy, he then says someone is now on the way "lights and siren."

What that strongly suggests is the dispatcher originally coded the call as meriting a non-emergency response and only upgraded it to a Code 3 (lights-and-siren) response once the shooting had occurred.

It ought to be reassuring to people wherever this occurred that "someone is breaking into my house" is considered unworthy of an emergency response by their police dept. That is, until the robber has already been shot.

Sertorious,

Are you a LEO? You are making a lot of assumptions based on few facts... because the call taker didn't initially mention lights and siren doesn't preclude the possibility that the officers were responding code 3. BTW, it's the officer that decides the mode of response, not the dispatcher (IAW guidelines, policies, and supervisors input...)

It's difficult to read most pro-2A (I'm rabidly pro RKBA) as a cop because so many bash cops so frequently with so little actual information....I get tired of the JBT comments, etc. etc. etc.

Is there a version of the castle doctrine in effect in the incident? Seems to me if there is, than the first comment about no warning is irrelevant. Secondly, the cops were probably dispatched "code 2" which means hurry but no sirens (or lights at the end) to avoid scaring off the burgler.

Chunk,

No, I am not a LEO, I'm a lawyer. But I was an EMT for 7 years and worked alongside 5 different Law Enforcement Organizations during those years.

I agree that I was making an assumption. Frankly, I was somewhat surprised to hear the dispatcher mention the manner of response.

I still think it's a decent assumption. He first says he has dispatched a car, then he says (after the shot) that he has one coming code 3 (paraphrasing).

Officer-selected response mode may be the norm, but at least one of the organizations I worked with included the mode of response in the dispatch. That is, the dispatch would be something like, "Patrol XX, Respond Code 3 to report of . . . ."

Anyway, you very well may be right. But I could be right too. Anyway, I certainly didn't mean it as a general dig against cops. I was always very glad to have LEOs with me on my EMS calls (even if one sheriff's deputy did almost T-Bone me when we were both responding to a shooting, but that's a story for another day. . .)

Alan A. has a good point, too. Maybe Code 2 is smarter if the burglar is still around.

The questions were dumb, but it sounded like the dispatcher was just trying to keep the lady on the phone until officers arrived. His response about "lights and siren" was after the woman begged him to please hurry. It didn't sound like he changed his approach to the situation, merely responding to the woman's panic.
Your opinions may vary.