City admits 911 procedures were not followed when Parker Wells went missing
Posted Sep 22, 2026 10:35 am.
The City of Calgary says critical 911 procedures were not followed on the day Parker Wells disappeared.
An internal review by Calgary 911 found that while existing policies were adequate, staff failed to apply them correctly when the 11‑year‑old went missing.
“The procedures in this case were not followed, that led to a delay in dispatching a Priority 1 call,” said Iain Bushell, Director of Emergency Management and Community Safety with The City of Calgary.
A Priority 1 event is defined by the City of Calgary as “an emergency event that requires an immediate, top‑urgency police response.”
The review determined the first call from Parker’s day home at 10:53 a.m. on July 16 should have been treated as an endangered missing child and escalated immediately. A supervisor reviewed the call but did not reassess or escalate it, despite information that should have triggered a Priority 1 response.
When the day home called back at 11:24 a.m., a Priority 1 missing‑person event was created at 11:41 a.m., nearly 50 minutes after the first call. The review says that delay may have affected how quickly police were dispatched.
Parker, who was autistic and non‑verbal, went missing after leaving his day home in Thorncliffe. The search ended tragically on July 29 when police found a child’s body in a stormwater culvert near Deerfoot Trail.
Investigators concluded staff did not follow missing‑person policies, resulting in a slower police notification during a critical window. Disciplinary action has been taken and one of the two operators involved is no longer with the city.
With more than one million calls processed annually, Bushell says the pressure on operators is immense. The city has since added a second supervisor to confirm dispatch decisions, aiming to prevent similar breakdowns.
“We have improved our review process, so when a call is not dispatched, the supervisor reviews why the call wasn’t dispatched,” Bushell said.
In addition to more frequent supervisor reviews, the city says other changes are underway including additional oversight and mentoring, mandatory policy refreshers, stronger decision‑making briefings, a broader policy review to reduce ambiguity, and expanded training for new recruits and supervisors, including critical thinking and emotional intelligence.
Advocate Jennifer Ball, who is pushing for updates to Canada’s Amber Alert system, says the findings are difficult but necessary.
“I’m so glad they did the review,” she said. “There’s just so much that needs to be changed.”
Ball says Parker’s death must lead to lasting reform.
“We’re not perfect, we’re not a perfect society,” she said. “Parker is the catalyst of change.”
