Detroit FFs Union: Better Safety after Violent Medical Call

The head of Detroit's firefighters union is calling for better police protection first responders following a violent stabbing during a medical call over the weekend.

Paramedics responded to a man in his 50s suffering a possible heart attack Saturday night at a house on Arizona Street, WJBK-TV reports. While medics worked, Darius Calhoun, 26, began punching the walls and demanding to see the person having the medical emergency.

Calhoun then grabbed a woman in the house and dragged her into a bedroom, where he allegedly stabbed her 15 times. Once they heard the attack, the paramedics and called dispatchers.

"It was a chaotic scene and everybody did what they could given the circumstances and how everything erupted at the time," Detroit Police Cmdr. Tiffany Stewart told WJBK.

Police arrived at the house about six minutes later, but Calhoun had fled the scene by that time. 

"It's in the report this individual had blood on him, and looked like he was putting a weapon away, so our firefighters and the medics wearing their vests—that's all we have to protect us—kind of stepped aside and let him go," Mike Nevin, president of the Detroit Fire Fighters Association, Local 344, told WJBK. "They didn't know if he had any other weapons with him, and then he took off."

Police are searching for Calhoun in connection with the stabbing. The victim in the attack, as well as the man who suffered the medical emergency, died at the scene.

"This is stuff that we're going to have to fix internally," Nevin said. "I've got some super big issues here when we are in a situation like this. We don't have a secret code. We don't have a way to let central office know we are in danger ourselves, then they start repeating what is going on."