Kathryn Beckel, Dispatcher

In January 2020 she was a dispatcher at the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office; she had been there for 2 years.

Dispatchers handle all incoming 911 and non-emergent calls, gather information, and send aresponse whether it’s law fire or medical.
Emergency calls come in on 911, they classify the type of emergency and whether it needs an immediate response.
If it is a non-emergent call they give them the non-emergency number to call back.
Categorization is based on the information received.
They put it in their call screens and the computer decides the type of call.
Exhibit 208 is the original 911 call, E209 is the non-emergent call.
Beckel took the second call but not the original 911 call.
She recognizes the voice on the original 911 call as the same person who she spoke to. The caller gave the same name in both calls: Tecia Stauch.
Exhibit 208 is the 911 call, 2 minutes 28 seconds (very bad quality):

She gives the address, has to give it twice; gives the phone number she is calling from; her name as Tecia.
She is unsure if she needs to call this number or not but her son was supposed to be home at 6PM and it’s almost 7 and she checked all his friends’ houses and he isn’t there. She doesn’t know anyone else to call.
She doesn’t know if there’s a time limit of missing reports but he’s only 11.
They give her the non-emergency number to call; she apologizes for calling 911 and takes the number down.

Exhibit 209 is the non-emergency number call, 8 minutes 7 seconds (bad quality again)

She explains again and gives her address.
She says she last saw him between 3:30 and 4 but he was supposed to be home at 6.
Gives a height and weight estimate of 4’10” and 90 pounds.
Says he had on a blue jacket zipped up and blue tennis shoes.
He takes Vyvanse every day.
She says there was some stuff last night and in the morning with her husband but Gannon has never been in trouble and is a straight A student.
She says Al told her that Gannon told him about a friend who asked him about bath salts; she says she told him to explain to Gannon how bad bath salts are.
She says her daughter went to the park and he wasn’t there and they checked all the neighbors houses.
“Who was the last person to see him?” Letecia says: I guess me?
He was supposed to be playing outside because they have to play outside for so many hours when it’s nice before they can use technology.
Al lets him walk around the neighborhood and talk to friends, she doesn’t know any of the parents.

Beckel has taken similar calls regarding missing children; probably upward of 50.
Normally with a child of that age who hasn’t run away before the parents usually sound more scared and anxious but it sounds normal for older runaways.
It was not as similar to other calls regarding young children as it was to older runaway calls.
A timestamp is generated when the 911 call is placed and when someone is dispatched out.
The first call came in on January 27th at 6:55 PM; the non-emergent line was at 7:02 PM.

Cross Examination

The emotion was somewhere in between a missing 5 year old and a missing 15 year old (very concerned, a little concerned).