Woman who called 999 nearly 1000 times in less than a year jailed

A woman from Manchester has been sentenced to 16 weeks in prison after calling 999 a total of 990 times between July 2022 to April 2023.

Despite being arrested on suspicion of malicious communications which caused her to be issued with a Criminal Behaviour Order (CBO) in May 2023, she continued to call emergency services a further 50 times.

The calls are often very abusive and aggressive and despite the conditions of her CBO ordering her not to contact police unless she had a genuine emergency to report, the CBO did not deter her from calling and holding up 999 lines for people with genuine emergencies.

Last week, she was further arrested and appeared at Manchester Magistrates on Friday 10 September and as a result of her breaching her CBO she was given a 16-week sentence which is suspended for 12 months.

Force Contact Centre Manager Matt Hindmarch, said: “There are some people who think it’s acceptable to waste police time and resources, may have been ahead of members of the public in the queue. Preventing people from receiving the help they need in a timely manner – it could be the difference between life and death.

“I’d like to thank officers across the force who have relentlessly pursued cases like this to bring those responsible to justice.

“We will continue to monitor and investigate these types of calls to identify those causing a nuisance on our 999 lines, we are committed to bringing them to justice for their actions to free up the queues for the people of Greater Manchester to receive the service they deserve from our police force.

“If you are in a situation where you need to speak to the police, please think before you call. The use of the 999 system is for emergencies only and we have other ways you can speak with us by either using 101 for non-emergencies or reporting to us on gmp.police.uk.”