Salt Lake County | featured news

A lawsuit alleges two state agencies gave preferential treatment to a tow truck company, and that a Utah Highway Patrol trooper sexually harassed a woman who complained that her employer was being slighted.
West Coast Towing, based in Lehi, planned to file the lawsuit Monday in state court in Salt Lake City.
The complaint says the company has lost “at least $630,000” in revenue because a UHP sergeant and an employee of the Utah Department of Transportation have been bypassing what is called the...

Intermountain Medical Center’s natural feel and Primary Children’s Hospital’s elegant form have helped put them on a list of the 20 most beautiful hospital campuses in the country.
Intermountain Medical Center, in Murray and Primary Children’s, located in Salt Lake City, ranked 13th and 19th respectively in a Soliant Health annual poll, out of more than 50 U.S. medical facilities nominated. The Utah hospitals are the only sites in the state represented on the list this year – down from four in 2...

A 49-year-old Cottonwood Heights man was charged Monday with starting a July 4th grass fire that damaged a nearby home by setting off aerial fireworks at his own home.
Richard C. Otterstrom was charged in 3rd District Court with one count of reckless burning, a class A misdemeanor punishable by up to a year in jail.
An arraignment hearing is set for Aug. 10.
Following the fire, investigators found several spent fireworks in the gutter in front of Otterstrom’s home, near 3400 E.

Salt Lake City police confirmed that a man’s fatal fall from a freeway overpass onto light rail lines below was an apparent suicide.
SLCPD Detective Greg Wilking said the man is believed to have jumped from the overpass, where 900 South exits Interstate 15 onto South Temple Street, about 9:20 a.m. Monday.
The man’s identity was not released.
Utah Transit Authority provided buses to transport TRAX passengers around the scene late Monday morning as the investigation continued, Wilking said.
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Three teenage boys who have admitted responsibility for the November death of West Valley City police Officer Cody Brotherson are scheduled to be sentenced Monday in juvenile court.
Brotherson, 25, was killed Nov. 6 when he was struck by a stolen vehicle — in which the three teens were riding — while laying down a set of spike strips.
The three boys were each charged with first-degree felony murder for Brotherson’s death, along with car theft, failure to stop for police and other crimes. Last ...

A gradual demobilization was under way Monday along the fire lines near southern Utah’s Brian Head resort, where remaining crews hoped to have a 71,660-acre blaze tamed by next weekend.
About 700 firefighters remained at the Brian Head Fire, roughly half the number that fought the blaze as its height. The fire, sparked June 17 by a weed-burning project gone wrong, destroyed 13 homes and forced 1,500 residents to flee.
All evacuees had been allowed to return and the fire was 80 percent contained ...

A big and timely turnout by Kanab volunteer sandbaggers kept flooding from heavy weekend rainfall from doing much damage in the southern Utah hamlet, the Kane County Sheriff’s Office says.
Between 7:30 p.m. and 9:30 p.m. Sunday, the mountains near the southern Utah community of 4,500 got 2.2 inches of rain.

A cycle of scattered thunderstorms and rain showers will usher in Utah’s new work week, but you will be disappointed if you expect that forecast to bring markedly cooler temperatures.
Highs along northern Utah’s Wasatch Front will soar into the upper-90s on Tuesday, a hot, occasionally humid encore of Monday’s forecast — and just a few degrees below this past weekend’s heat.
The misery index will be even higher in the state’s red rocks and high deserts, however.

After a rough week in the Rio Grande Street area, House Speaker Greg Hughes had finally seen about enough.
Prompted by a fatal hit-and-run, the beating of a minor league baseball player and a drug sweep aimed at driving a cartel out of Pioneer Park, the speaker said the homeless situation in downtown Salt Lake City is deteriorating and it may be time for the state to take the lead.
Hughes is to be commended for speaking out on this now. The state should have stepped in months ago, and why Gov...

While talking with Salt Lake City’s mayor on Thursday, House Speaker Greg Hughes didn’t mention deploying troops, nor did he use the word “czar” to describe a hypothetical state official who would take over efforts to combat homelessness.
“My conversation with him was not like what was in the press,” said Jackie Biskupski on Friday. “He just wants to make sure we’re successful.”
But Hughes’ recent depiction of the area surrounding the 1,100-bed shelter at 210 S. Rio Grande St. — as a spiraling h...