I’ve been in two accidents in the last year (yay for me! For the record, neither were my fault) and both times the police came out.
One accident was in the middle of the day (lunch hour) in downtown Glendale, CA. No one was hurt and both cars were drivable. The police came out and did their job.
The next accident I wrote about in the Pit a while ago. Seven at night, my little town of Bakersfield, I had to go to the hospital. Six police officers responded (Two squard cars with two each, one motorcycle, one of the ones in the pickup trucks).
It’s odd no one responded.
Well, I understand what you’re saying, but I’ve worked places where we were warned not to stray too far from procedure when responding to what appeared to be an emergency. It might be a scam (“My baby’s choking to death!” and everyone comes running) to create a distraction so no one’s guarding the register. You can be helpful, but store security should never be neglected.
Anecdote: I didn’t see it myself, but when I was working at McD’s, the manager told us the first December I worked there not to keep an eye on any guys wearing Santa suits. Turned out, the year before, such a person had come into the store in full Santa regalia, including a beard that covered almost all his face. He was a huge hit with all the other customers, hugging little kids, telling people if they were on the “naughty” or “nice” list, and so on…
…Turns out he was a pickpocket. People have already paid when they’re eating McD’s food, so people didn’t notice their missing wallets until they tried to get on the bus or go to other stores. About a dozen people running back in frantically, by which time Santa was long gone. And how could we identify him, with that beard? Also, I imagine the phone call the manager made to the cops was a real treat.