Name Alex Shaffer | Role Alpine skier | |
Born January 23, 1976 (age 44) Aspen, Colorado, U.S. | ||
Alexandra Shaffer Wubbels (born January 23, 1976, in Aspen, Colorado) is an American nurse and former alpine skier who competed in the 1998 Winter Olympics and 2002 Winter Olympics as Alex Shaffer. In July 2017 she was involved in an incident during which she attempted to prevent police from unlawfully obtaining blood from an unconscious patient in her care.
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Olympic career
Competing in the Alpine skiing events at the 1998 Winter Olympics held in Nagano, Japan, Alex Shaffer finished 9th in the Women's Combined and did not finish in the Women's Giant Slalom. She also competed in the Alpine Skiing events at the 2002 Winter Olympics held in Salt Lake City, Utah, where she finished 28th in the Women's Giant Slalom.
Blood draw incident
Shaffer began working as a nurse at the University of Utah Hospital in Salt Lake City in 2009, using the name Alex Wubbels after her marriage.
On July 26, 2017, she was arrested for obstructing justice while on duty as a nurse at the University of Utah Hospital in Salt Lake City. The incident was later made public via the officers' body cameras. The arresting officer, Salt Lake City Police Department detective Jeff Payne, demanded blood to be drawn from an unconscious patient, but she stated that doing so would be a violation of hospital policy, which required that the patient be under arrest, or had given consent, or that the police were in possession of a warrant. The patient was the victim in a car crash and was not under arrest, but was unconscious and therefore unable to consent, and the police had not obtained a warrant. She followed hospital policy and refused to allow the officer to draw blood, and the officer proceeded to put her in handcuffs and into the front passenger seat of his cruiser. The year-old hospital policy related to blood draws reflects the legal position in the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, as well as the Supreme Court of the United States' ruling in Birchfield v. North Dakota and had been agreed to by the police department. She was later released without charge.
Personal life
In June 2014 Shaffer married fellow skier Cory Wubbels. They had their first child in December 2014.