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from the in-soviet-russia-you-pay-nurse dept.
NPR reports a nurse in Utah who was arrested on July 26th in Utah has reached a $500,000 settlement with the city and hospital system. Nurse Alex Wubbels was arrested by Detective Jeff Payne for refusing to take a blood sample from a patient without the patient's consent or a warrant. When she tried to present the detective with the hospital policy on the subject, the Detective announced she was under arrest and took her away in handcuffs. The Detective has since been fired after it was initially reported that he was "counseled."
At the beginning of the [body camera] video, she is seen calmly reading the officer the hospital's policy not to allow blood to be drawn without a warrant or the patient's consent, unless the patient is under arrest. "This is something you guys agreed to with this hospital," she explains. Then the officer lunges at Wubbels, forces her outside and handcuffs her as she screams that she has done nothing wrong. The footage drew widespread outrage when it was released by the nurse and her attorney. It became part of a broader conversation about police use of force.
The Washington Post reported, "Wubbels said she will donate some of the proceeds to a fund that will help people obtain body camera footage and provide free legal aid for open records requests. She is also planning to use the money to raise awareness about workplace violence against nurses." Alex Wubbels, in a guest blog post at the American Nurses Association, describes the campaign as #EndNurseAbuse. Workplace violence against nurses is not something covered that often outside the profession, and yet something every ER worker knows about. Usually, though, it isn't the police who are the perpetrators.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by khallow on Thursday November 02 2017, @12:34PM (2 children)
Supposedly, that's not showing a lot of liability for law enforcement here with the accident. But as I've noted before, any liability that they would have, probably could be reduced by showing that the patient, a Bill Gray of Idaho, had illicit drugs in his system which could be found via the blood sample. I think that's the motive behind this abuse of law - to protect a department and officers from liability.
Here's where things get really shifty. It strains credulity to suppose that Detective Payne would risk this sort of illegal behavior merely for a blood sample that might show illicit drugs. What else did he have in mind and what other laws was he willing to break?
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Thursday November 02 2017, @02:01PM
"Detective" Pain is a cop. The only laws that apply are whatever he feels like doing at the moment.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @02:10PM
And it was implied in an earlier story that this was being done in an attempt to prove the off duty officer had drugs or alcohol in his system to help cover for their own incompetent actions regarding the police chase which might in fact have been done under questionable circumstances over a fleeing suspect that did not warrant a car chase.
Keep in mind, car chases are normally reserved for suspects who are considered a clear and present danger to others, and if they are not you would normally file an APB on the suspects car and not give chase, so that they could be tailed and/or cornered in a safer situation that doesn't risk life and property as occurred in this case.
Given the fact that there are also corruption charges being investigated against the officer and lieutenant involved in this case who were fired, I think there is a lot more going on here than just a miscarriage of justice against this Nurse. For which we need to thank her for posting this video which turned out to be the catalyst for shining light into some of the darker regions of her county's law enforcement apparatus.