US couple butt-dial police, who trace call to find them engaged in ‘sexual festivities’ along highway
A couple in Ohio learnt the hard way that, when “engaging in sexual festivities”, it’s probably best that they turn off their phones first and not do the deed next to a highway.
The two, ages 39 and 37, were hauled into police cruisers on Sunday and charged with public indecency – a first-degree misdemeanour – after an officer came upon them having sex where they could be easily seen, along Interstate 680, near Youngstown in Ohio.
“The area where the two chose to engage in the sexual festivities was completely visible to all of the vehicles passing by,” a report from the Youngstown police said.
Two officers were sent there after police received a call at around 2.55pm on Sunday.
A report in The Vindicator, a newspaper in Ohio, said the call was considered an “open line” because the man’s phone, which was switched to emergency mode, appeared to have dialled 911 without him knowing, and a police dispatcher wasn’t able to get a response.
When in emergency mode, a phone can call 911 when either the function “talk” or “send” is pressed.
The police report said that as the two officers were searching the area where they traced the phone, one of them heard a woman “moaning up the hill”.
He then found a man and woman having sex near a tree.
“I announced ourselves, and the two stopped and started to get dressed,” the officer said in the report.
The two were issued citations for public indecency and released with a summons to appear in court. If found guilty, they may be jailed up to six months and fined up to $1,000.
In an earlier case in mid-May of an unintended call landing with a 911 dispatcher, two men were arrested as they were robbing a warehouse in North Carolina.
A dispatcher with the Monroe Police Department picked up the call at around 3.30am on May 17 and at first thought the caller was “in distress”, according to a post on the department’s Facebook page.
The dispatcher then heard the caller talking to another person about what items would be “best to steal”.
Officers were dispatched to the warehouse
They found one of the burglars still at the scene. The other man, who investigators later discovered was the one who “butt-dialled” 911, managed to flee.
The men had loaded around 60 metal construction beams worth around US$12,000 (S$16,000) into a vehicle.
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