Nikie Mayo, Anderson Independent-Mail (South Carolina)

Investigators say an Upstate man has made more than three dozen false calls to 911, including some this week that caused Anderson County firefighters to rush to a church believing someone was trapped inside.

Ralph Lawson, 43, of Greenville is accused of making calls about fake medical emergencies and about fires that never existed.

Two of those calls this week caused Anderson County firefighters to hurry to Living Sanctuary Church in Piedmont. Anderson County Fire Chief Billy Gibson said the calls, nearly identical, came in Monday and Tuesday nights.

“The reports were that there was fire coming from the church and someone was entrapped,” Gibson said. “That caused us to roll multiple trucks and everything we thought we might need. The same kind of thing happened to us two nights in a row.”

Emergency responders in Greenville County were dealing with similar calls, which have also been attributed to Lawson.

On Tuesday, the Greenville County Sheriff’s Office received a 911 call from a man who said his wife was unconscious. Master Deputy Laura Campbell said paramedics and deputies responded to Sandra Avenue in Greenville and found that “no medical emergency ever existed.” Campbell said deputies were investigating that medical call when they learned of the false fire calls in Anderson County.

“We knew that those fire calls were transferred to us from Greenville County,” Gibson said.

Campbell said that while investigating those calls, deputies learned that Lawson has made 38 false calls to 911 since July 2010. Most of those calls – 21 of them – have been made in the last three months, investigators said.

Lawson was arrested Thursday and was released six hours later on a $3,000 recognizance bond.

On Friday, no one answered the telephone at the number listed on Lawson’s arrest warrant.

Gibson said false calls unnecessarily put his firefighters – and the public – at risk.

“You’re talking about firefighters who are in all their gear and apparatuses for no good reason,” Gibson said. “Besides that, responding to fake calls can cost thousands of dollars. It also ties up resources that may be needed on a legitimate call. If we had had a legitimate call in the same area, the fake calls could have delayed our response time in getting to someone who really needed us.”

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