Salt Lake City Police Apologize To Nurse Arrested For Doing Her Job
Posted at 11:30 pm on September 1, 2017 by Patterico
Salt Lake City police apologized Friday for arresting a nurse who, citing hospital policy, refused to let officers draw blood from an unconscious accident victim. The arrest of Alex Wubbels, who was later released without charge, was captured on body camera video that the police chief said was alarming.
The incident happened July 26, when an accident victim was admitted to the University of Utah Hospital burn unit in a coma. Though the man was not a suspect in the crash, which killed the other driver, police asked for his blood to be drawn.
Wubbels, the charge nurse in the burn unit, presented the officers with a printout of hospital policy on drawing blood and said their request did not meet the criteria. Hospital policy specified police needed either a judge’s order or the patient’s consent, or the patient needed to be under arrest, before obtaining a blood sample.
“I’m just trying to do what I’m supposed to do. That’s all,” Wubbels tells the officers, according to the body camera video.
If they think the apology is forestalling a lawsuit, I would like to take this opportunity to heartily laugh at them. The lawsuit is coming. The only question is how big the payout will be.
https://www.redstate.com/patterico/2017/09/01/salt-lake-city-police-apologize-to-nurse-arrested-for-doing-her-job/
The injured unconscious man was an innocent hurt in a hot pursuit chase. The police knowing a lawsuit would likely be filed in the future sought the blood draw in a vain hope the innocent man might have alcohol in his blood. No reason to think it. But it would help the case of the police down the line if he could be shown to be partially responsible. The nurse rightly and lawfully refused. As she told the officer who arrested her, the police needed either consent, a warrant or to have placed the man under arrest. Barring that, her refusal was the right thing to do. I support the police but they can screw up and they did here. Two officers are being fired over this and now they'll likely have TWO lawsuits to deal with. |
