A man has been arrested after a woman alerted emergency services that she was in danger by calling 999 and ordering a pizza.
North Yorkshire Police confirmed that they received a call from a woman pretending to be speaking to a takeaway pizza company, leading a quick-thinking call handler to ask her if she was in trouble.
After the woman responded 'yes', the handler was able to ascertain further details about the situation by asking questions which the caller could answer with either 'yes' or 'no.'
The police force said that from her answers, as well as by texting with the woman, they were able to establish that she was at risk of being harmed by a man she was travelling on a bus with.
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After using an online tracker to locate where the bus was, police were sent to the scene and were able to stop the bus in the York area.
A 40-year-old man from Leeds was subsequently arrested, before being released with no further action. In a statement North Yorkshire Police said the woman had been provided with safeguarding services and support following the incident.
"This was really good work by everyone involved, allowing us to take immediate action to safeguard a vulnerable woman," said Inspector Dan Spence, Force Incident Manager in North Yorkshire Police’s Control Room.
"I’m aware of people using the ‘pizza ordering’ technique abroad to contact the police, but I cannot recall a similar call in North Yorkshire.
Similar stories of victims disguising emergency calls to alert police that they're in danger have been reported in the past, including an incident in 2019 which saw a domestic abuse victim also successfully contact police without her abuser realising by pretending to order a pizza.
However despite some viral social media posts having claimed that dispatchers are 'trained' to pick up on the technique, emergency service call handlers have stressed that this is not the case.
In 2018, Christopher Carver, the dispatch centre operations director for the National Emergency Number Association in the US, warned people against trying to use secret phrases to contact police, saying 'setting any expectations of secret phrases that will work with any 911 centre is potentially very dangerous'.
North Yorkshire Police said that calls handlers have specific protocols in place when dealing with callers who are unable to talk.
They said: "If no service is requested but anything suspicious is heard throughout the process, the operator will connect you to a police call handler.
"It is always best to speak to the operator if you can, even by whispering. You may also be asked to cough or tap the keys on your phone in response to questions."
Topics: UK News
Hannah Smith