Kid Shot on Stretcher, Medics Run

Police: Masked gunman killed teen in Detroit while paramedics watched

DETROIT (AP) — A masked man ordered paramedics to step away from a teenager who lay bleeding on a stretcher from bullet wounds, then killed him with a shotgun blast to the head, authorities said.

Police on Tuesday searched for the gunman who killed Billie Rutledge, 17, on Detroit's north side.

Investigators said they were trying to determine whether Rutledge was killed because he was connected to, or knew too much about, the March 12 slaying of Shadad Yousif, 45, a businessman who lived on the same street.

Police said two paramedics found Rutledge lying in a driveway early Saturday, bleeding and calling for help. They put him on a stretcher and cut off his clothing to find the gunshot wounds.

But as the paramedics carried Rutledge to the waiting ambulance, they turned and saw a man with a shotgun who said, "Watch out, watch out," police said. The paramedics ran a short distance and heard two shots.

The paramedics were not injured.

http://www.courttv.com/news/2005/0607/masked_ap.html

Disgusting. Too bad none of them was packing and could run up behind him and shoot HIM in the head.

Unreal. What an f'ed up society this has become.

Where were the police?

Wow that is pretty surreal. Go to save someone then have the guy who most likely shot the kid already come up and blow his head off.

Damn

Hmm -- somebody wanted him dead awful bad. Is this gang related? Terrorist related? (in regards to him knowing to0 much about a guy with a very Islamic sounding guy's death).

Just sounds like a very interesting news snippet.

As for the paramedics -- as much as I wish that more folks were able to embody the selfless position of being willing to lay their life down for a stranger -- I really can't expect it.

And I BELIEVE that folks getting wounded/killed while in a paramedics care is a pretty rare thing. Anyone else ever heard of it before?

I don't imagine that such a rare occurence would warrant the carrying/use of a weapon by thousands of paramedics/EMTs who would never have the occasion for their use. But who knows?

Very interesting story, nonetheless.

Thats just sick. Its hard to read and watch news now a days. Also i head stats about violent crime being on the decline but then i read stuff like this and turn on the news and hear about parts of DC and PG county and just wonder abotu the world.

wow, that is pretty effed up. I though Philly was tough. That takes the cake.

When I was a (trainee) EMT, they really stressed that rule #1 was EMT safety.

I took a class from a Paramedic who was also a Paramedic instructor. He told me that for one of his classes, he had a "exam" at the local Red Cross. The students were brought, two at a time, into the conference room, where they were briefed on the scenario.

The scenario is: You two are the crew of an ambulance. You've been dispatched to a local roadhouse. The radio dispatch is "Severe bleeding, multiple injuries, possible gunshot". The next room has been set up as the "scene", with patients. Your mission is to evaluate the patients prioritize and treat them. Your ambulance just arrived in the parking lot. The exercise begins when you walk through that door.

The only pair of students who "passed" the exam, pulled out two conference room chairs and sat down.

"What are you waiting for?"

"The cops. Radio said 'gunshots'."

Right answer.

(The instructor also gave a passing grade to two other students who didn't do what he wanted. They were both Deputies. They went in, but they ignored all the 'bleeding' and 'unconscious' patients, and searched everybody in the room, removing the starters pistol that one of the 'patients' was laying on top of, with orders to 'regain consciousness' when the trainees were distracted.)

I guess that makes sense, I would have never thought of that.

Larry summed up my thought...Where were the cops? I would hope anytime a ambulance is dispatched to a injured person on the street or alley a patrol unit would be sent..

The response time must suck in Detroit.

I'm a paramedic in a neighborhood that has a lot of MS13 violence. We never go into any area where there has been a report of any kind of assault or violence related injury without the police. I have had a few patients that would have faired better had we gone in before the police, but I can't help them if I am laid out bleeding beside them. More important to me than that, is that I have a wife and child to go home to when my shift is over. In most cases even the most violent thugs will not bother the paramedics. They know who is coming to pick them up if they get stabbed or shot, but you never know.

Well what about a situation where part of a building has collapsed and can fall down on top of people. Do they wait for police to drag the injured people out and risk having everyone in the place crushed to death? After all they are in at least as much danger there, but there is not much more that police can do then they can.

Do firemen wait to go into a burning building if they know it was done by arson and there are no police around at the moment, in case the arsonist is waiting around to jump them, or shoot at them?

(I don't mean to criticize EMTs but I always kind of had an image of people running out there in the face of danger and risking their lives for other people...but I guess that is just not realistic)

(On a side note, I don't suppose that they provide bulletproof jackets for EMTs...even on a small scale?)

Also, for the other side of the story,

My ambulance's response area included what was the largest low-income housing project in Virginia. We went in there routinely, and everybody in the project knew us. They even knew that the EMTs in the blue shirts were firemen, and the white shirts were volunteers. (They also, I suspect, knew that our ambulance, unlike most, didn't carry drugs.)

Only "problem" I ever had there was once when we responded to what turned out to be a gunshot wound. (A police-installed gunshot wound.)

I think every cop in the county was there. Our patient is handcuffed in the back of a squad car. The cops have established a perimiter about 20 feet away from the car, with about 1000 people surrounding the cops.

We're trying to examing a wound on the back of the patient's thigh. (I'm outside the car, shining a flashlight through the back window to illuminate the wound.

The cops are pacing the perimiter, and they're taunting the crowd.

"You want a piece of this? C'mon in here. We got lots more room. How about you? You got a problem?"

I'm thinking I would have been safer going in there without the cops.

Visionary,

Different agencies have different rules. The main rule for EMT safety is "dead EMTs don't save lives", but the application differs from place to place.

In your question about a possible building collapse, I have no doubt that some jurisdictions, the rule is "that's the fireman's job to get him out, then you work on him."

For example, where I was, one example they gave was a hypothetical guy who's attempting suicide by locking himself in his car in his garage. The rule is: The firemen have BPA (think SCUBA), and can go in there and get him without exposing themselves to monoxide. (My personal rule, which never arose, was that at the time, I was able to hold my breath for well over a minute, while performing physical activity. So I always told myself that if the situation ever arrived, I was going in, and gee, folks, I'm a volunteer, so the worst they can do is fire me.)

In another place I lived, the paramedics were cops. They told me that, legally, it made some things a lot easier. (One example they gave was, kid gets hurt in a playground. In Chesapeake, I would've had to wait for permission to treat the kid. But in this placem the EMT who's a cop is allowed to radio a magistrate, and his statement over the radio is sworn testimony. He tells the magistrate that the parents aren't here, and the magistrate can declare that the kid's been abandoned, and the state authorises treatment. Same thing applies if nobody answers the door at the patient's house. The cop can get a warrant over the radio.)

Originally posted by fatal

Where were the police?

That's the odd thing...they normally show up together, or the cops are the first on the scene...

Originally posted by Larry

When I was a (trainee) EMT, they really stressed that rule #1 was EMT safety.

I took a class from a Paramedic who was also a Paramedic instructor. He told me that for one of his classes, he had a "exam" at the local Red Cross. The students were brought, two at a time, into the conference room, where they were briefed on the scenario.

The scenario is: You two are the crew of an ambulance. You've been dispatched to a local roadhouse. The radio dispatch is "Severe bleeding, multiple injuries, possible gunshot". The next room has been set up as the "scene", with patients. Your mission is to evaluate the patients prioritize and treat them. Your ambulance just arrived in the parking lot. The exercise begins when you walk through that door.

The only pair of students who "passed" the exam, pulled out two conference room chairs and sat down.

"What are you waiting for?"

"The cops. Radio said 'gunshots'."

Right answer.

(The instructor also gave a passing grade to two other students who didn't do what he wanted. They were both Deputies. They went in, but they ignored all the 'bleeding' and 'unconscious'

patients, and searched everybody in the room, removing the starters pistol that one of the 'patients' was laying on top of, with orders to 'regain consciousness' when the trainees were distracted.)

Same question when I took the test. ALWAYS wait for the police.

Originally posted by Phat Hog

That's the odd thing...they normally show up together, or the cops are the first on the scene...

From the article

Police said two paramedics found Rutledge lying in a driveway early Saturday, bleeding and calling for help. They put him on a stretcher and cut off his clothing to find the gunshot wounds.

It's tough to interpret exactly what that statement means, but it almost sounds to me like the paramedics were passing by and found the guy. It never said they were called to scene. If they were, they probably would have expected a gunman.