“Double Crime!” Truck Driver Accused Of Murdering Utah Officer Also Held Woman Against Her Will
DEBARYLIFE – New court filings reveal that a truck driver who is suspected of deliberately killing a police officer during a traffic stop on a Utah highway had been detaining a woman inside the cab of his vehicle against her will.
While assisting a lady who had escaped from the sleeper part of Michael Aaron Jayne’s semitrailer, the 42-year-old is accused of crashing his truck into Santaquin Police Sgt. Bill Hooser, who passed away at the scene on May 5. The fallen cop was honored at a public funeral on Monday by friends, family, fellow officers, and state officials.
Jayne, of Garrett, Indiana, was taken into custody on Saturday on accusations of kidnapping, burglary, aggravated murder targeting law enforcement, theft of a vehicle, and disregarding the officers’ signals to halt.
He is being held in the Utah County Jail without bond; he was already on federal probation. There were no official charges against him in Utah as of Monday.
After an anonymous 911 caller claimed that someone was standing on the back of the semitrailer as it traveled north on Interstate 15, Hooser, 50, and Utah Highway Patrol Trooper Dustin Griffiths stopped the vehicle at 6:30 a.m. in Santaquin, 65 miles (105 kilometers) south of Salt Lake City. Police continued to investigate who, if anyone, was riding on the semitrailer’s back.
A woman rushed from the passenger side of the truck and raced to Hooser, begging for assistance, while Jayne was preoccupied chatting with Griffiths.
After an argument at a truck stop in Beaver, Utah, she later told authorities that she had been riding with Jayne freely up until that point. After leaving her behind, Jayne drove away but came back several times. Jayne threatened her with a knife and bear spray until she agreed to get back in the truck when she refused, according to the affidavit.
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The truck driver shut the door and left when Griffiths grabbed for Jayne’s door handle. As the officers scrambled to get into their cars, the driver executed a sharp U-turn. According to court filings, he rammed the officer into a patrol car as he raced towards Hooser with black smoke streaming from his exhaust stacks.
Then Jayne accelerated his truck at Griffiths and the female, but they managed to dodge the impact by jumping out of the way.
After setting out on foot to a Maverik petrol station, Jayne—whose criminal past spans more than two decades—discovered a lorry with its doors unfastened and its keys inside. He drove a 1976 Ford F250 to an abandoned home in Mount Pleasant, according to police, after stealing the lorry.
A police maneuver near Vernal, some 160 miles (260 km) east of Santaquin, caused him to lose control of the Ford F150 that he subsequently crashed after he broke into the house through the garage, stealing boots and the keys, according to investigators. After being detained at the crash scene, Jayne was driven to a hospital and received treatment there for a week.
Courtney, the youngest of Hooser’s daughters, spoke during his burial on Monday. She called her father a hero and expressed her heartbreak that he wouldn’t be able to marry her later this year.
She sobbed as she added, “There has been confusion, grief, anger, and sadness.” “For the past few days, I’ve been reflecting on my dad’s passing and the things he took from us without feeling any regret.”
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Gov. Spencer Cox of Utah referred to the suspect as a “despicable human being” and reassured Courtney that a large number of fathers would respect her father and be there for her on her wedding day.
Jayne has a history of attacking police officers, as shown in her court records. She has been found guilty of battery, assault with a lethal weapon, and making threats of violence against police.
He attempted to hit an Oregon State Police officer in Klamath County with his car in March 2009, which led to charges of attempted aggravated murder in Oregon. He was sentenced to just over three years in jail after entering a guilty plea to attempted assault and being a felon in possession of body armor.
In court records on Monday, Jayne’s lawyer was not named.