In a conversation with fellow officers, the Salt Lake City police detective who arrested a nurse when she followed hospital policy and refused to take blood from an unconscious patient commented that in the future he’d ”take good patients elsewhere.”
Detective Jeff Payne told a fellow officer that he works a second job as a paramedic with Gold Cross and brings patients to University Hospital, body camera footage obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune shows.
When the other officer tells Payne that the staff at the hospital probably won’t be very happy with him, Payne responds, ”I’ll bring them all the transients and take good patients elsewhere.”
At another point in the body camera footage, an officer from the U. tells Payne ”I don’t think this arrest is going to stick.” The officer questions whether the nurse’s actions were obstructing justice.
Payne wonders out loud on the video how the incident may affect his other job. During the encounter, Payne argued with nurse Alex Wubbels about getting a blood sample from a patient.
Payne went to the hospital to obtain a blood sample from 43-year-old William Gray, a reserve officer in the Rigby, Idaho, Police Department who suffered burns during a fiery crash July 26 in Cache County.
The University of Utah hospital has a policy not to take blood from an unconscious patient unless the person is under arrest, unless there is a warrant allowing the draw or unless the patient consents.
When Wubbels refused to go against hospital policy, Payne says, he “physically drug her out of the ER.”
The Unified Police Department is investigating the incident after footage drew concern from the public.
Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski apologized Friday for the officer’s conduct.