united-states police common-law moral-duty
USA: Do 911/PD phone operators have a &#39;duty to rescue&#39;?
<p>As I understand it: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty_to_rescue" rel="nofollow noreferrer">'duty to rescue'</a> does not <em><strong>generally</strong></em> exist for regular citizens in the USA. (Some exceptions apply!)</p>
<p>Let's say I'm in Europe and I call the general inquiry phone number of a local (city) police department in the United States to report a suicidal individual local to them. Do any of the following entities have a 'duty to rescue' in the following situations?:</p>
<ol>
<li>Police officers answering the phone.</li>
<li>Non-police officer employees answering phones at a (local?) PD.</li>
<li>The dispatch operators that #1 and #2 connect me to.</li>
<li>The dispatch operators I get when I dial 911 while being in the USA myself.</li>
<li>The legal entities of either the police department or the emergency services dispatch (or other involved party?)</li>
</ol>
<hr />
<p>Note: I have tried to keep this question as narrow/focused as possible. Let me know if there's any issues with the question. I'm not familiar with law all that much.</p>

<h2>No</h2>
<p>More generally, government agencies have <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/18/us/parkland-shooting-lawsuit-ruling-police.html?smid=tw-nytnational&amp;smtyp=cur" rel="nofollow noreferrer">no duty to protect</a>.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>In the cases <em>DeShaney vs. Winnebago</em> and <em>Town of Castle Rock vs. Gonzales</em>, the supreme court has ruled that police agencies are not obligated to provide protection of citizens. In other words, police are well within their rights to <a href="https://mises.org/power-market/police-have-no-duty-protect-you-federal-court-affirms-yet-again" rel="nofollow noreferrer">pick and choose</a> when to intervene to protect the lives and property of others — even when a threat is apparent.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In the <a href="/questions/tagged/united-kingdom" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;united-kingdom&#39;" rel="tag">united-kingdom</a> , the situation is the same with the relevant case being <a href="https://www.dacbeachcroft.com/en/gb/articles/2018/february/duty-of-care-owed-by-police-clarified-by-supreme-court-with-a-sting-in-the-tail/" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>Hill v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire</em></a>, a precedent followed in <a href="/questions/tagged/australia" class="post-tag" title="show questions tagged &#39;australia&#39;" rel="tag">australia</a>.</p>
<p>However, the police, fire fighters, ambulance officers etc. do owe the same common law duty of care as everyone else where such a duty exists if and when they do choose to act, unless specifically exempted by law. For example, they owe a duty to people in custody or innocent bystanders.</p>
