A 34-year-old man was on pain pills for a back problem when he was shot four times by police inside a northern Utah hospital emergency room, a family member said.
Jason Burr was sent to the emergency room at Cache Valley Hospital in North Logan after being told he needed immediate surgery, said Gar Workman, the grandfather of Burr’s wife, Cassy Burr.
Burr returned to the emergency room with two handguns on Friday morning after he was earlier turned away for help there, Workman said.
“Jason had some serious back problems,” he told The Herald Journal of Logan.
Workman said Burr was on strong pain medication at the time, and he thinks Burr was not in his right mind. “I guess the pain was really intensive, so he took all the pills that he had,” he said.
Burr was shot after he made demands and pulled out the two guns, police said. He was injured by two probation officers who happened to be with a parolee at the hospital, located about 85 miles north of Salt Lake City. Nobody else was injured.
Burr, who suffered chest wounds, was listed in critical but stable condition at a Salt Lake City hospital.
“With a little luck he could live. But right now no one has an idea or not,” Workman said, adding he was unsure if Burr’s guns were loaded.
Burr pleaded guilty in August 2010 to falsely obtaining and dispensing prescription drugs, Utah online court records show. He was sentenced to 30 days in jail and put on three years of probation.
The shooting prompted a lockdown of the hospital and a nearby elementary school.
