Cottonwood Heights Corruption Investigations

It’s now been over a year since our last Cottonwood Heights investigation, and our YouTube viewers (30,000 of which watched the video below) are asking why we don’t provide an update. While this story has died down in the media, and the Canyon Inn has sadly closed, Utah Stories has felt that in the wake…

Richard Markosian

May 13, 2019

It’s now been over a year since our last Cottonwood Heights investigation, and our YouTube viewers (30,000 of which watched the video below) are asking why we don’t provide an update.

While this story has died down in the media, and the Canyon Inn has sadly closed, Utah Stories has felt that in the wake of police shootings and the escalation of violence (mostly unfairly against police officers) we should remain quiet regarding this story.

It is abundantly clear from the requested GRAMMA results we received last year that CHPD was indeed issuing bogus DUIs, and that their police records do not match the records Utah Stories obtained from the Holladay City Court filings.

While we strongly support all of our men and women in blue, CHPD was engaged in targeting one local business’ s customers with harassment—and they have gotten away with it. Now they are attempting to clean up their trail by altering their records.

Above the law

Two former CHPD officers came forward and admitted that Canyon Inn was targeted for harassment.

One officer was fired from CHPD, the other has chosen to remain anonymous.

It’s sad more officers haven’t come forward publicly. Because of this, Mayor Kelvyn Cullimore, Police Chief Robby Russo, and all of those culpable, will continue to evade prosecution for their crimes.

The work Utah Stories has put into investigating this story has beenenormous. We hope that the stories and investigations (listed below) will at least serve the public (and possibly the media) in some way.

If more former CHPD officers eventually choose to come forward so that the proper authorities can continue investigating, only then will justice finally be served.

The numbers don’t lie

In a final statement about bogus DUIs, Chief of Police Robby Russo said they conducted their own internal investigation and found that their DUI dismissals between 2009 and 2012 were “completely in-line with other PDs in Utah, and that they were right around a 3–4 percent DUI dismissal.”

Utah Stories GRAMMA results (obtained for 2012) show otherwise. Readers can see for themselves.

In 2012 CHPD issued 66 DUIs with 12 dismissals. Compare this with Unified PD at 17 and UHP at 14. That’s a total of 31 DUIs with only 3 dismissals.

Cottonwood Heights dismissals were 18 percent; other agency dismissals were 9 percent. Readers can review the GRAMA results here.

In answering why these results differ from their own, they could only say that it could be because some of the people charged with DUI were serving in the military and their cases were dismissed.

Editor’s Note

While further investigative work remains, we feel it would only be productive to conduct this research and devote the man hours if the anonymous officer or more officers choose to come forward and admit to the targeted harassment, or by reaching out to those whose DUIs were overturned and obtaining specific details about each case.

We also encourage any concerned citizens or business owners to obtain the specific court filings for the years 2009–2014 and examine in detail each court outcome, as we did for 2012.

Utah Stories obtained records of all DUIs issued during these years but not the outcomes (as we had requested). Those GRAMMA result records can be found here.

Read all of our Cottonwood Heights Corruption Investigations below:

Cottonwood Heights: Council Member Finds Opposition to Transparency

https://utahstories.com/2019/04/cottonwood-heights-council-member-finds-opposition-to-transparency/

Former CHPD Officer Beau Babka goes on record “Canyon Inn was a Target” (1,400 shares on Facebook)

https://utahstories.com/2015/07/beau-babka-there-was-a-meeting-where-it-was-mentioned-that-canyon-inn-would-be-a-target/

I am a story teller and journalist. I have a passion for farmers, local craftspeople, and folks who aspire to create, build and grow their business in the local marketplace. Why local? By supporting locally-owned businesses we create more opportunity for entrepreneurs, and we claim our sovereignty to shape our communities how we want to see them. I aspire to build Utah Stories Magazine into a household Utah name, and assist Utah businesses and makers with marketing. On the journalism side of things my passion is investigative journalism that offers true insight into issues. I believe strongly in the forth estate: strong, meaningful, insightful journalism is essential to a free market Democracy.