"Maybe later tonight" turned into "definitely tonight" when I started thinking about this case.
Missing State Worker's Body Found in SC - WRAL
Between home health care, child protective services, state aid investigators and the other numerous fields where workers venture into the homes or offices of others -- lots of people are exposed to risk that should be addressed.
Granted, some organizations are more squared away than others when it comes to protecting their field workers, but from what I've seen the vast majority are not. The corporate agencies have a little more money and support behind field employees than state agencies so that's a factor, but this kind of thing can boil down to local management more often than not.
In this specific case, it looks like a state insurence examiner was performing an audit. The insurence agency owner (being audited) is charged - but the details are unclear. I've been looking into this kind of issue for the last few months for home health care workers, and so far - I've come up with these recommendations:
- Most mobile phone providers offer GPS phones and GPS tracking services. At a minimum, the workers should have GPS phones with tracking enabled. At a maximum some providers can even put apps on the phones for sending updates and even features that could be used to discretely send a "help me" message. The downside is that someone from your origination would need to be online, monitoring the service to keep tabs on everyone if you want real time response to problems.
- There should be strict rules for how workers keep the phones with them at all times, etc..
- For recurring services - coordination should be made with the law enforcement agency responsible for the district that the target house/office is in. This should be done at the lowest level (district captain). I know this seems like a bit much but if some coordination can be made at the front end it will pay off. Take the district captains out to lunch and go over what you do, and what the risks are. This could end up being a very basic introduction / interaction but it has a lot of potential. You dropping the squad a line when you've got field agents in their district could end up with officers keeping an eye on things if they are not handling other calls.Of course this may not be feasible in all agencies but you can hit the high risk districts based on risk / threat assessments.
- (Use risk and threat assessments to categorize basic types of calls)
- Train field agents in conflict deescalation, personal safety / security and any other applicable skills.
- Seems like a no-brainer - but make sure field agents have a method and process for checking in and out of visits. No contact after a set period of time could trigger a call to check on things. No answer could trigger response.
- Remember that it's not just the subject you're visiting that you should consider. Multiple family homes and all sorts of other situations bring unknown individuals into the picture.
