Sarah McKinley received help 14 minutes after Blanchard home invasion call, 911 records reveal

McKinley has said it took authorities 21 minutes to reach her after Justin Shane Martin began pounding on her door on New Year's Eve.

A 911 call released to The Oklahoman by Grady County shows that the alleged accomplice in the home invasion, Dustin Louis Stewart, drove panicked through a pasture near McKinley's home minutes after the confrontation and told the dispatcher he was “scared to death” and “I think it was my friend that got shot.”

McKinley was at home with her 3-month old boy at the time Martin forced his way into her home. Two minutes before officers arrived, she shot and killed Martin with a 12-gauge shotgun.

Timeline

Blanchard Det. Dan Huff said McKinley's cellphone shows she placed the initial call to Grady County at 1:54 p.m. A Grady County dispatcher received a call from McKinley at 1:55 p.m., and the call was transferred to Blanchard police at 2 p.m., according to records provided by law enforcement.

Blanchard records show police chief Walt Thompson arrived at the home eight minutes after the call was transferred.

Two minutes before he arrived, at 2:06 p.m., McKinley shot Martin in the neck. Martin had shoved his way through her barricaded front door holding a knife in a gloved hand.

Rural sections of the 1,100-square mile county are patrolled by three on-duty sheriff's deputies at a time, Grady County Sheriff Art Kell said. Response times to calls are typically 15 to 25 minutes, he said. In Blanchard, a 33-square mile community, the average response time is 4.8 minutes, Thompson said. McKinley lives on the edge of town.

The time it took for law enforcement to arrive probably felt like an eternity to McKinley, Thompson said.

Kamby Schmidt lives in a rural area outside of Blanchard that is patrolled by the sheriff's department. While she doesn't blame law enforcement for the time it took them to reach McKinley, she said 14 minutes is still a long time to be without help.

“That's a long time — if you're in there hiding and someone's trying to get through your door,” Schmidt said.