Callers complain of 911 response times during JSO computer system outage

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office confirmed to Action News Jax that its computer systems are back up and running.

We first told you on Sunday when the city said suspicious cyber activity caused the network to be shut down out of an abundance of caution.

Sources confirmed to us that the outage affected the computer-assisted dispatch system.

Since then, Action News Jax received several complaints about 911 calls and the non-emergency line not picking up early this week.

Although JSO said their system came back online early Wednesday and service to the public was not affected, some 911 callers question that.

“911 {usually goes} straight through, picks up no problems. This time was a different story,” Jacksonville resident Jason Lynch said.

On Monday, Lynch went to go check on his aunt after she was recently in the hospital.

When he found her curled up on the bedroom floor, he knew something wasn’t right.

“I called her sister. her sister told me to call 911 which was no answer for 14 minutes it took,” Lynch said.

Lynch said it took five or six tries, between the 911 line and non-emergency line before dispatch finally picked up the 14-minute call.

“I was actually pissed because I’m like, how in the world can you call the one number you’re supposed to call to get help for your family or whoever you need it for, and there’s no one there to pick up?” Lynch said.

Feeling frustrated and helpless, Lynch hopped on his bike and rode to the nearest fire station almost a mile from his aunt’s house.

He said the call finally came through when he was there.

He’s not the only one who experienced issues calling both lines early this week.

A caller told us he tried to report a hit-and-run and couldn’t get through to either number, so he went directly to the sheriff’s office.

Another post online said three attempts to the non-emergency line went unanswered.

Action News Jax has been continuously investigating 911 call times.

We first told you when 911 wait times increased to more than double the state standard of 10 seconds, which was blamed on staffing shortages.

“They do need to make sure this does not happen again, because God forbid it to be somebody else in a worse condition,” Lynch said.

Action News Jax reached out to JSO for more information on 911 wait times and abandoned calls during the outage. We did not get an answer, but we made public records request for that information ourselves.

Luckily, Lynch’s aunt was OK.

Action News Jax will keep you updated as soon as we get those numbers from JSO during the system outage.

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