Police staff condemned over death

Jamie's family said he was a "fantastic, fun-loving" person

Police call staff dealing with an incident where a teenager died at a scrap yard made errors which may have cost him his life, said a watchdog.

Jamie Hatfield, 18, died after falling into a metal scrap yard just off Leach Lane, in Mexborough, South Yorkshire.

The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) started an investigation into the handling of emergency calls of the incident.

South Yorkshire Police said the failures had been acknowledged.

Mr Hatfield had been on a night out when he fell from Leach Lane into the scrap yard on 28 July, 2006. His body was found the next morning by the owner of the scrap yard.

South Yorkshire Police received a 999 call just after midnight from someone who had seen him fall. A further call was made by the same person at 1232 BST.

'Inaccurate information'

The IPCC investigation found the initial call handler failed to take telephone contact details for the caller, recorded incorrect details of the incident location and failed to correctly assess the seriousness of the incident.

A dispatcher then picked up on the call log, and realising the seriousness of the incident, deployed officers.

Due to the inaccurate information recorded by the original handler officers went to the wrong location.

The dispatcher then failed to update the log that officers had been unable to find anything and deployed them on another urgent job.

As a result of failing to update the log, a different call handler, who received the second 999 call, was under the impression officers had not yet attended.

Essentially, nobody involved in this sad chain of events took control of the incident Nicholas Long, IPCC commissioner

This call handler, who was new to post, failed to record details of her conversation and did not take the caller's telephone number.

The log relating to the incident was eventually closed at 0500 BST.

As a result of the investigation, the IPCC has made a number of recommendations about the training of control room staff.

Nicholas Long, IPCC commissioner for Yorkshire and Humberside, said: "Essentially, nobody involved in this sad chain of events took control of the incident.

"Instead assumptions were made by all about what the others were doing.

"As a result, any chance there might have been of saving Jamie Hatfield's life was lost."

Bob Dyson, South Yorkshire Police deputy chief constable, said: "We accept the recommendations of the IPCC in this case and have acted upon them.

"We acknowledge we failed to interpret the information given to us and deal with it accordingly.

"South Yorkshire Police deals effectively and successfully with an average of 1,500 calls from members of the public every day.

"We accept on this occasion that we didn't do as well as we could have and we extend our sincere sympathies to Mr Hatfield's family and friends."