Widow of UTA worker killed by Harrisons files suit

PAT REAVY, Deseret News
Posted 5/17/18

“Unfortunately, the panic buttons are only as good as the support staff monitoring those communications. Upon information and belief, UTA failed to provide adequate training, supervision or attention to the receiving end of ‘panic button’ communications, such that a distress signal sent via a panic button by Mr. Ricks was not received or acknowledged in anything close to a timely, reasonable manner,” the lawsuit states.

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Widow of UTA worker killed by Harrisons files suit

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(COURTESY PHOTO / Deseret News) 

The widow of murdered Utah Transit Authority worker Kay Ricks has filed a lawsuit against the two men responsible for her husband’s killing as well as UTA for allegedly not doing enough to protect him.

In May 2016, Ricks, 63, a maintenance worker with UTA, was working at the Ballpark Station, 180 W. 1300 South, when he was kidnapped by Dereck James “DJ” Harrison, 23, and his father, Flint Wayne Harrison, 51. The Harrisons were on the run from police after kidnapping and assaulting a woman and her daughters in Centerville, Utah.

Using Ricks’ UTA vehicle with Ricks tied up in the back, the Harrisons drove to a rural area about 16 miles outside of Kemmerer, Wyoming, off U.S. 189, slit Ricks’ throat and beat him with a metal bar during a brutal 18-minute attack, and then left his body under sagebrush. His body was found five days later.

A manhunt for the Harrisons ended with their arrests in the Half Moon Lake area near Pinedale, Wyo., several days later.

D. Brian Boggess, the attorney representing the Ricks family, said the family has filed the lawsuit in hopes of finding answers they are still seeking two years after Ricks’ death, while encouraging UTA to protect others.

“Our hope is that through this lawsuit, not only will the Ricks family get some answers, but UTA and other entities like UTA will have a chance to re-examine their practices, and that re-examination will save lives in the future,” Boggess said.

According to her lawsuit filed Friday — the day before the two-year anniversary of Kay Ricks’ kidnapping — Lorie Jean Ricks said prior to her husband’s death union representatives had warned “about the danger of UTA maintenance employees working alone in certain locations, including those locations serviced by Mr. Ricks.”

Despite that, “UTA failed or refused to assign a second employee or apprentice trainee to work with its maintenance employees,” the lawsuit states.

The company also failed to install GPS receivers in their maintenance trucks, court documents state.

Instead, UTA gave maintenance workers a “panic button” to use in emergencies, according to the lawsuit.

“Unfortunately, the panic buttons are only as good as the support staff monitoring those communications. Upon information and belief, UTA failed to provide adequate training, supervision or attention to the receiving end of ‘panic button’ communications, such that a distress signal sent via a panic button by Mr. Ricks was not received or acknowledged in anything close to a timely, reasonable manner,” the lawsuit states.

“These failures on the part of UTA and its board, to implement a policy requiring a second employee to be with maintenance employees, to install GPS receivers in UTA maintenance vehicles and to monitor and respond to a distress signal, would prove to have deadly consequences,” the lawsuit continued.

According to the lawsuit, Ricks attempted to use his panic button as he was being assaulted by the Harrisons, but “UTA failed to respond to the distress signal.”

Boggess said Tuesday that following Ricks’ disappearance, UTA was more concerned with finding the missing truck than figuring out what happened to Ricks.

“UTA’s first concern after Mr. Ricks went missing was to find their truck. They believed Kay Ricks had stolen their truck, so that’s what they were putting their resources in when they had received a distress call from Kay Ricks, and they should have done more to follow up on that aspect rather than their truck,” Boggess said.

In addition to UTA, the lawsuit names the estate of Flint Harrison and DJ Harrison as defendants, as well as several John Does and Doe entities.

In 2017, DJ Harrison pleaded guilty to killing Ricks during the commission of a kidnapping, and to a second charge of confining him for the purpose of taking his truck.

He also pleaded guilty in the Centerville case to five counts of aggravated kidnapping, a first-degree felony. He was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Flint Harrison committed suicide two months after his arrest while incarcerated at the Davis County Jail.

After DJ Harrison’s sentencing in Wyoming a year ago, Lori Ricks issued a statement that said, in part, her family would forgive DJ Harrison so they don’t have to speak or think of him again and can move on with their lives.

A spokesman for UTA said Tuesday that the agency had not officially received the lawsuit and would wait to read it before commenting.

The Kemmerer Gazette will follow this story with updates as they develop over the next few months.