Polk County Commissioners have unanimously approved a $200,000 settlement offered to Loretta Pickards family estate.
She was on the phone with 911 while her home was on fire but responding firefighters never went inside to rescue her. Polk County Fire Rescue officials originally said it was too dangerous for firefighters to enter the burning house.
However, a later report blamed a lack of communication between dispatch and firefighters. The 242-page independent report also pointed at other mistakes in the agency’s response.
- It was never made clear to firefighters that Pickard, who was on the phone with 911, was the same person who was in the house. The report says that was due to lack of communication — the computer that firefighters use that had information about the victim’s location and condition was down that night, and that information was also never said over radios, either.
- Firefighters did not have life-saving equipment for search-and-rescue with them, and had “tunnel vision” to just focus on getting the fire out rather than make a rescue.
The niece of Lorretta Pickard, 76, said her family decided to pursue a lawsuit because they want to make sure this never happens again.
Attorney Chris Borzell filed the notice of intent to initiate litigation on March 29, on behalf of James Arthur Pickard, Loretta’s husband, and their two children, Sharon Rose Bush, and James Leroy Pickard.