No answer as disabled woman calls 999 for help

A DISABLED Limerick woman told yesterday how her 999 calls for help went unanswered while she and her daughter were being attacked in their home by an intruder.

The phone rang out as many as six times before the attacker grabbed it from Ann Thuillier.

However, minutes later when the intruder left her bedroom, she rang the other emergency number, 112, using her mobile phone. This was instantly answered and the gardaí alerted.

Ms Thuillier, aged 56, was at her Castletroy home on March 9 with her daughter Danielle, aged 23, when a non-national forced his way into the house and threatened them.

Ms Thuillier said she was surprised the call did not get an immediate response.

She made the emergency call from the upstairs bedroom, where she spends most of her time due to ME, the debilitating illness, when the attack happened between 3pm and 3.30pm.

On hearing her daughter’s screams downstairs, she picked up the land line phone.

Ms Thuillier said yesterday: “I rang 999 and it rang out about four times and there was no answer.”

In her statement to gardaí after the attack she said the 999 call rang out as many as six times.

By then the intruder moved upstairs and took the phone from her.

She said: “He locked me in the bedroom and when I heard him go downstairs I rang 112 and there was an instant answer. I used my mobile phone which he did not notice.”

A spokeswoman for Eircom, which runs the 999 service, said they could only investigate if they are asked to do so by the caller.

She said: “It would appear this person was not a customer of ours at the time and, unless we get a direct authorisation from this person, we cannot investigate. The average speed for answering a 999 call is less than a second.”

The man who pleaded guilty to falsely imprisoning Ms Thuillier and her daughter has been remanded in custody for sentencing at Limerick Circuit Court next month.