Arrested Utah Nurse Is $500K Richer

Alex Wubbels plans to use payout from city, hospital to help others
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Nov 1, 2017 1:46 AM CDT
Nurse Will Use Payout to Help Others Obtain Police Body-Cam Footage
In this Sept. 1, 2017 photo, nurse Alex Wubbels speaks during an interview in Salt Lake City.   (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer, file)

A Utah nurse who was arrested for refusing to let a police officer draw blood from an unconscious patient settled Tuesday with Salt Lake City and the university that runs the hospital for $500,000. Nurse Alex Wubbels and her lawyer, Karra Porter, announced the move nearly two months after they released police body-camera video showing Detective Jeff Payne handcuffing Wubbels, the AP reports. The footage drew widespread attention online amid the national debate about police use of force. The settlement covers all possible defendants in a lawsuit, including individual police officers, university police, and hospital security guards. The payout will be divided among the city and the University of Utah.

Wubbels plans to use part of the money to fund legal help for others trying to get similar body-camera video. She says that in cases like hers, video is essential to being heard and believed. "We all deserve to know the truth, and the truth comes when you see the actual raw footage, and that's what happened in my case," she says. "No matter how truthful I was in telling my story, it was nothing compared to what people saw and the visceral reaction people experienced when watching the footage." She says she also plans to donate to a nurse's union and help lead a campaign to stop physical and verbal abuse of nurses on the job. (Payne has been fired and his supervisor has been demoted.)

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