SEATTLE NEWS ARCHIVES & FEATURES
Police wrongly told wife her husband was dead
Jun 8, 2012, 1:51 PM | Updated: 5:52 pm
Melody Halls was on an emotional roller coaster this week
when Canadian police mistakenly told her that her husband
had died in a motorcycle crash.
“It was about ten o’clock in the morning when I answered a
knock at the door. There were about two police officers
and a lady from victim’s assistance standing there. They
told me they were very sorry to inform me my husband had
been killed in an accident this morning,” Melody told 97.3 KIRO FM’s Dori Monson Show this week.
Melody was stunned. Only three hours earlier, she had seen
her husband off when he went to work. As she started to
panic, she thought the police must have been wrong.
“I had to start asking questions. Right away, when they
told me what time the accident had happened, they told me
it happened at one o’clock [in the morning]. I knew
something was not right because I had seen my husband at
seven o’clock that morning on his way to work,” said
Melody.
She thought that the time line may have been wrong and her
husband, Greg Nauff, still could have been the crash
victim. When she called him on the phone, police realized
they had a case of mistaken identity.
Greg’s 1992 Suzuki Intruder motorcycle had been stolen.
The thief, a neighbor that the couple did not know, was
the victim of the crash.
Melody said she was glad she didn’t automatically believe
what they told her.
“I really didn’t know for those first couple of minutes. I
started asking them questions like ‘what time did this
happen,’ ‘where did this happen,’ and it wasn’t making
sense to me.”
Melody wished that the police officers had asked her more
questions to make sure the victim was her husband, to
confirm his identity rather than just announce his death.
“The victim didn’t have any ID on him, so they just went
by the registration, which was my husband’s registration.
And they really didn’t use any other means of finding out
the identity of the victim,” said Melody.
Melody said the panic this situation caused has made her
appreciate her husband much more.
“Even while the police were still here, I had to get my
husband on the phone and track him down and find him and
hear his voice to hear that he was okay,” said Melody.
