Free Republic

If you had any hopes that the mainstream media was slowly beginning to realize that people don’t like pandemic mandates that impinge on their personal freedoms and might back off from such authoritarian notions, you may safely put those hopes aside. Or at least that’s the case with the Salt Lake Tribune newspaper in Utah. While others have been gradually looking at ways to return life to normal now that there are vaccines and other treatments available to keep the worst of the COVID threat under control, the editorial board at the Tribune recently veered off in the opposite direction....

After watching several people drop their ballots off at a drop box outside the Salt Lake County government center, it is clear people are excited to vote this year. “I’m voting!” said one woman, while raising both her arms to the sky. “Thanks!” said another man, who ran to the drop box. “It’s just things are nuts,” said another woman, who said everyone should vote. Maybe it’s because we believe we're so divided right now, or we want our voices to be heard. Whatever the reason, Salt Lake County residents are voting in record numbers. “People are returning their ballots...

The Salt Lake City police detective who arrested nurse Alex Wubbels for not allowing police to draw blood from an unconscious patient has been fired from his part-time paramedic job with Gold Cross Ambulance Service. Payne was placed on paid administrative leave from his full-time job as an officer with the Salt Lake City Police Department after a video of the arrest went viral. In a separate video recorded after the arrest, Payne asked another officer how the incident would affect his part-time position with the ambulance company. Payne bragged that he could retaliate against the hospital by only bringing...

By now, most people probably have seen the disturbing video of a Salt Lake City Cop manhandling and arresting a University of Utah nurse for doing her job, following protocol, and protecting an unconscious patient in her care. The chaotic scene can be viewed here. In brief, Detective Jeff Payne demanded access to an unconscious accident victim who was suspected of no wrongdoing in order to draw the man’s blood for the police investigation. Nurse Alex Wubbels cited hospital policy and an apparent agreement with the police department that allows a blood draw only with patient consent, or a warrant,...

Salt Lake City Mayor Jackie Biskupski announced that as a result of the criminal investigation being launched by the Salt Lake County District Attorney, Detective Jeff Payne will be placed on full administrative leave with pay. Later Friday night, police stated two employees are on administrative leave. It was not immediately clear who the second employee is.

A nurse says she was assaulted and illegally arrested by a Salt Lake City police detective for following a hospital policy that does not allow blood draws from unconscious patients. Footage from University Hospital and officer body cameras shows Detective Jeff Payne and nurse Alex Wubbels in a standoff over whether the policeman should be allowed to get a blood sample from a patient who had been injured in a July 26 collision in northern Utah that left another driver dead. Wubbels says blood cannot be taken from an unconscious patient unless the patient is under arrest, unless there is...

(SALT LAKE CITY) — A Utah police officer's body camera video shows a hospital nurse being handcuffed after refusing to draw blood on an unconscious patient. The video taken at University Hospital in Salt Lake City shows nurse Alex Wubbels calmly explaining to Salt Lake detective Jeff Payne that she couldn't draw blood on a patient who had been injured in a car accident. She told the officer a patient was required to give consent for a blood sample or be under arrest. Otherwise, she said police needed a warrant. The dispute ended with Payne telling the nurse she was...

Jackie Biskupski, the openly gay mayor-elect of Salt Lake City, isn't happy that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a group better known as the Mormons, clarified its stance on its membership requirements. Under policies disclosed last week, the LDS Church won't accept as members or missionaries children of same-sex couples. She now wants a meeting with church leaders to discuss "policies." The move evoked echoes of Houston's Mayor Annise Parker who, in a two-year battle over a human rights bill, at one point subpoenaed sermons from local pastors opposed to the measure and sought a public vote....

By Michael Allen, Fri, August 15, 2014 Dillon Taylor was shot and killed by Salt Lake City police outside a 7-Eleven store in South Salt Lake City, Utah, on Monday night.... Police have not said whether or not Taylor was actually armed, but family members claim he was not.

SALT LAKE CITY — Eight LDS missionaries serving in the Salt Lake City East Mission and their leaders are working with the Forest Service to remove a flagpole that the missionaries cemented to the top of Mount Olympus earlier this week. Hikers discovered the flagpole with a U.S. Flag and an autographed mission T-shirt on Forest Service lands and alerted rangers. The Forest Service confirmed that posting the flagpole was indeed breaking the law. “You would need to get a permit to put up a flagpole. In wilderness it wouldn’t be allowed at all,” said Kathy Jo Pollock of Uinta-Wasatch-Cache...

US attorney's office reports shooting at federal courthouse in Salt Lake City, at least 1 hurt.

After Islamic gunmen attacked the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, Kenya, the collective reaction from the US media was to speculate whether such terror could happen here, as if a jihadist assault on a mall inside America had never before been tried. CNN was typical: “Can it happen here? Yes, say security experts, but it hasn’t.” News flash: it did. On the evening of Feb. 12, 2007, a young Muslim man walked into the Trolley Square mall in Salt Lake City with a pistol-grip, 12-gauge shotgun and a 38-caliber revolver and opened fire on shoppers, killing five and wounding four others,...

As of yesterday you are a Citizen of the World with no Privacy—no matter in which country you are located. The ribbon-cutting ceremony invite, sent to a select group of Utah politicians and dignitaries for the massive Utah Data Centre in Bluffdale, Utah was as mysterious as the facility itself. Canada Free Press (CFP) could find no pictures, no accounts of the event anywhere on the Internet today even though an earlier media release said reporters would be there. The bigger-than-the-CIA National Security Agency (NSA) had previously stated that the facility would start operations in September, 2013. Why should this...

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC 4 News) - Organizers of Tuesday's "Celebration of Marriage" at Utah's Capitol Hill got a much larger crowd than they probably expected. The evening was intended to celebrate traditional family. While that did happen, people who attended were surrounded by hundreds gay rights activists. Tuesday's celebration of traditional family marriage had everything: the Osmonds, the Governor, and hundreds of gay rights party crashers. Needless to say it was not what traditional family supporters expected. "Do you think it makes this thing tense?" asked Reporter Brian Carlson. "In some ways yes, in some ways no," said Claus...

SALT LAKE CITY — Utah's Catholic leader is urging Gov. Gary Herbert to veto a measure eliminating the need for a permit to carry a concealed gun in the state. Bishop John C. Wester of the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City wrote to Herbert that the bill "establishes a culture in Utah that prioritizes deadly weapons over human life." . . . . Salt Lake City Mayor Ralph Becker and Alissa Parker, whose daughter was among 20 students killed in December's school shooting in Newton, Connecticut, joined Wester in pressing for a veto.

Sheriffs vs fedsGrandstanding is useless exercise First Published Jan 24 2013 01:01 am • Last Updated Jan 24 2013 01:01 am http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/opinion/55677972-82/law-constitution-federal-gun.html.csp

One of Utah's largest newspapers, located in the heart of Mormon country, has endorsed President Obama over Republican challenger Mitt Romney. The Salt Lake Tribune endorsed Mr. Obama on Friday in an editorial that praised the president for engineering passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to stimulate the economy and accused Mr. Romney of flip-flopping and being "willing to say anything to get elected." The paper acknowledged that their choice may be surprising to some, considering Mr. Romney's Mormon faith and his leadership and financial turnaround of the 2002 Winter Olympics held in Salt Lake City. The Tribune...

The Salt Lake Tribune is receiving national media attention for its endorsement of the reelection of President Barack Obama. News organizations including CNN, the Washington Post and POLITICO all seem shocked that the state's leading newspaper is endorsing the incumbent, not the "favorite son."

Olympics: Mitt Romney has gotten blasted on all sides for questioning London's Olympic preparation. The overlooked fact is that Romney actually knows how to run an Olympics. You would have thought Great Britain and the U.S. were in a crisis and recalling each others' ambassadors, given the overblown, overwrought windbaggery directed at Romney, who is making his first trip abroad as a Republican presidential candidate, with London as his first stop. Someone asked him what he thought of London's Olympic preparations and he replied there could be reason for concern, citing reports of labor and security problems. See, the London...

SALT LAKE CITY — A GOP activist who prosecutors say kidnapped and raped women that he met online and at church functions has been arrested and charged with 23 felonies. He appears to have targeted mostly LDS young adult women. Gregory Nathan Peterson, 37, of Orem, was charged Wednesday with seven counts of rape, three counts of object rape, two counts of aggravated kidnapping, nine counts of forcible sexual abuse, forcible sodomy, assault, burglary and sexual battery. Peterson is a GOP activist who held political events at his cabin in Heber City, 10160 E. Ridge Pine Drive, the same place...