The police officer who arrested a University Hospital nurse during a July 26 dispute over getting a blood draw from a patient, should immediately have been placed on administrative leave, according to Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski.
Instead, Salt Lake City police Detective Jeff Payne was not placed on leave until Sept. 1, a day after the nurse’s attorney publicly released police body cam footage of the arrest.
Another officer — believed to be Payne’s watch commander, Lt. James Tracy — also was placed on leave Sept. 1.
“There is no acceptable reason [that Payne and the other officer were not immediately put on leave],” Biskupski said in a the list of frequently asked questions she presented to city council members on Tuesday night.
Biskupski added that the decision by police officials to delay imposing leave was “regrettable.”
Biskupski noted, however, that Payne was immediately removed from the department’s blood draw program, in which police officers obtain blood samples from drivers in suspected DUI and fatal car crashes.
The mayor also said that she and SLCPD Chief Mike Brown first saw the video on Aug. 31, along with the rest of the public.
She said police command staff reviewed the video within 24 hours, but not Brown, who is “typically separated from the evidence of an internal affairs investigation until it is complete due to his role as the final arbiter in employment action.”
Biskupski said the police department’s internal affairs investigation was opened within 24 hours.
Once Biskupski saw the video, she reached out to the nurse, Alex Wubbels, to apologize.
She said she also directed her staff to reach out to Salt Lake County District Attorney Sim Gill about starting a criminal investigation, which Gill has said is underway.
Biskupski wrote that in addition to the internal affairs and DA investigations, the city’s independent Civilian Review Board is looking into the episode.
The mayor said the two police officers have not been fired because their jobs cannot be taken away without due process. In addition, the city has a contract with the Salt Lake Police Association, a union that represents officers, including Payne.
“The union contract provides additional procedural protections and processes that must be followed before any adverse employment action can be taken,” Biskuski wrote.
The last of the FAQs listed by Biskupski is: “What is happening now?”
“At the mayor’s directions, the city is continuing to work with stakeholders to ensure this never happens again,” she wrote. “This includes changing internal practices and reporting procedures, which kept the mayor from becoming immediately involved.”
Payne was at the hospital seeking a blood sample from a burned and unconscious patient, 43-year-old William Gray, who had been involved in a fiery collision the same day in northern Utah.
Gray was driving a semi north on U.S. 89/91 near Sardine Canyon when a man fleeing from the Utah Highway Patrol crashed a pickup truck into him head-on, according to Logan Police, who investigated the crash. That man, Marcos Torres, 26, died at the scene.
Logan police Capt. Tyson Budge has told The Tribune that an investigator on the crash called Salt Lake City police and requested the department get a blood draw on Gray, who was in the University Hospital’s burn unit.
Budge said such a request is routine, especially involving serious injury or fatal accidents, despite the fact that Gray was not a suspect in the crash.
Gray is a full-time truck driver who also serves as a reserve police officer in the Rigby, Idaho, Police Department.
In a news release, Rigby Police Chief Sam Tower thanked Wubbels and other University Hospital staff “for standing firm, and protecting Officer Gray’s rights as a patient and victim. Protecting the rights of others is truly a heroic act.”
Tower added: “It is important to remember that Officer Gray is the victim in this horrible event, and that at no time was he under any suspicion of wrongdoing. As he continues to heal, we would ask that his family be given privacy, respect, and prayers for continued recovery and peace.”
Initially in critical condition, Gary’s condition was recently listed as serious.
A GoFundMe page has been set up to raise funds to help Gray and his family.