SPANISH FORK — The man charged with capital murder in the death of Santaquin Police Sgt. Bill Hooser is once again facing additional charges for allegedly spraying a deputy at the Utah County Jail with an unknown liquid.

Michael Aaron Jayne, 43, of Garrett, Indiana — who is already awaiting trial on a charge of aggravated murder and is facing a possible death sentence if convicted — is now accused of propelling an unidentified liquid into the face of a Utah County sheriff’s deputy while incarcerated.

On Sunday, about 6:50 p.m., Jayne allegedly used his hands “to forcefully hit something on the inside of his cell door through the crack, causing liquid to spray out onto the victim. When this happened, the cell door was shut. It took planning and effort to shoot the substance through the crack in his door at the right time. The victim then stepped back and radioed for an additional deputy. I then entered the unit and saw the victim wipe his face and liquid droplets on the victim’s pants and shirt,” according to a police booking affidavit.

Deputies later reviewed surveillance video and saw Jayne watching the deputy as he entered the housing unit to do a head count, the affidavit states.

He was initially arrested and later charged for allegedly running over Hooser with a semitruck intentionally on May 5, 2024, according to charging documents. A preliminary hearing in that case is scheduled to begin Nov. 24.

In August, Jayne was charged with aggravated assault by a prisoner, a second-degree felony; two counts of assault by a prisoner, a third-degree felony; and causing property damage, a class A misdemeanor. In that case, he is accused of attacking multiple deputies on July 30.

In September, his defense team filed a motion stating they are “gravely concerned” that if their client isn’t moved out of the Utah County Jail, he may not live to see a trial. But just a week later, that motion was withdrawn.

When most people think about seafood production, a landlocked state like Utah may not be the first state that comes to mind. But Utah already plays a pivotal role in America’s seafood supply chain — thanks to the Great Salt Lake — and expanding aquaculture into deep open ocean waters off our coasts would bring even greater opportunities and benefits for Utah’s economy and local communities.

With demand for sustainable protein on the rise, aquaculture has become one of the fastest-growing food production systems. Advances in science and technology have made open-ocean aquaculture one of the most efficient and environmentally responsible methods for producing protein. Yet in the U.S., the industry remains largely untapped. Once a global leader in seafood production, America now ranks 18th in aquaculture and imports up to 85% of the seafood we consume, including half from overseas fish farms. Expanding U.S. aquaculture production off our shores through open-ocean aquaculture is critical to strengthening food security, creating jobs and ensuring American families have greater access to locally raised seafood.

Utah has a unique stake in this national effort. The Great Salt Lake is the world’s leading source of brine shrimp, a critical ingredient in aquaculture feeds. Brine shrimp provide the nutrition needed to raise healthy fish, and aquaculture operations across the U.S. depend on Utah’s supply. That connection generates an estimated $67 million for Utah’s economy each year, sustaining jobs and cementing Utah’s role in the seafood supply chain.

Utah’s fish feed industry is a prime example of how aquaculture expansion in the U.S. would deliver benefits far beyond America’s coastal states. New farms in federal waters would bring jobs and investment to waterfront areas, while ripple effects across the seafood supply chain would reach deep inland states. Utah producers would benefit from increased demand for fish feed, and farmers across the Heartland, including Utah’s own wheat and corn growers, would benefit from rising demand for American-grown crops that are used in plant-based aquaculture feeds. From hatcheries and feed suppliers to processors and retailers, seafood supply chain businesses throughout the state and across the country would benefit from growing demand for American-raised seafood.

But for the U.S. to realize the potential of open ocean aquaculture in federal waters, legislation is needed. The bipartisan Marine Aquaculture Research for America (MARA) Act of 2025, recently introduced in both the House and Senate (H.R.5746/S.2586), would create a pathway for open ocean aquaculture in federal waters, supporting the growth of U.S. seafood production. This bipartisan bill has already garnered strong support from leading environmental groups, seafood industry leaders, award-winning chefs and academics, who all recognize that aquaculture is a crucial tool for producing more sustainable protein, meeting rising demand and alleviating pressure on wild fisheries.

Utah is well positioned to benefit from the growth of aquaculture. Home to established companies and suppliers with decades of experience in aquaculture and aquafeed production, Utah businesses are ready to support the seafood supply chain and meet the increased demand that expanded U.S. aquaculture would create. At the same time, research institutions like Utah State University are advancing sustainable harvest practices that balance economic activity with the health of the Great Salt Lake.

Expanding U.S. aquaculture isn’t just about producing more seafood. It’s about creating jobs, strengthening food security and securing America’s future food supply while supporting communities nationwide, both inland and along the coast. With our established aquafeed producers, research expertise and strong ties to the seafood supply chain, Utah is ready to support aquaculture expansion in America. By passing the MARA Act and advancing American aquaculture, Congress can help deliver a stronger American seafood industry.

I don’t know if I believe in ghosts. But I very much believe in ghost tours.

Ghost tours are one of my favorite spooky season festivities. “Isn’t spooky season over?” you might ask. I, for one, don’t think so. The weather leading up to Halloween was unseasonably warm and it never truly felt gloomy enough to really get into the haunted spirit. But now, the week when we turned back the clocks, it’s been freezing in the mornings and I’ve felt existential dread every day at 1 p.m. when the sun starts to set. So I’m feeling gloomier and spookier than ever, and ready to think about how my town might be haunted.

I’ve done a lot of ghost tours in major cities, often to the chagrin of my travel companions. I forced my mom to take a Jack the Ripper tour with me in London. I’ll be honest, that one was more gruesome than I had anticipated. My husband had to tromp around Chicago with me for the mobsters and murder tour, which again, was pretty detailed about the specific ways the “ghosts” had been murdered. And I signed my friends and myself up for the official Savannah, Georgia, ghost tour. Which was, once again, gruesome.

These big, touristy cities all seemed to have plenty of gnarly stories to fill hours worth of guides’ tales while walking around their downtowns. It’s something that would never work in my small Utah city, I assumed. Foolishly.

So I was surprised and delighted to learn that there was a Draper, Utah, ghost tour available. I was so excited that I signed up without realizing I would be out of town for the last available tour date. When I reached out to cancel my reservation, the tour guide, Anna Sokol, kindly offered a private tour for when I was back in town.

This was Sokol’s third year doing the tour. Sokol — a history and spooky story enthusiast — started offering the free service while she was still in high school, believing she could gather enough spine-tingling stories about historic Draper to put together a tour. She was correct.

Now, as a freshman at Brigham Young University, Sokol has stayed committed to the tour and commuted back and forth from Provo to Draper to entertain the ghost-curious Draperites on many October nights.

We met in Draper Historic Park near the gazebo the day after Halloween, where she handed me the ghost detector she usually hands to children on the tour. Sokol was equipped with a binder full of dates, images and newspaper clippings, and a head full of Draper’s scariest stories. She began by pointing out the statue of Ebenezer Brown, the pioneer who settled in Draper in 1849. His life wasn’t any spookier than a typical pioneer, but, according to Sokol, a few generations down the family line, Brown’s great-great-great-grandson murdered his wife and tried to plead insanity. His plea failed when it quickly became apparent that his motive was long-held misogyny.

Next, Sokol showed me a home built in 1918 to house World War I veterans. It’s been a number of different businesses over the years and now functions as the coffee and soda shop Bubbles and Beans. It was Sokol’s high school job at the shop, and a spooky encounter she had there, that piqued her interest in Draper ghosts in the first place.

“We always knew it was a little haunted,” she told me.

One day, when she showed up for work, she found a few police officers outside the house talking to her co-workers. They had called the police after hearing footsteps in the attic and assuming there must be a squatter inside. But when the police went to the attic to investigate, they found that the layer of dust that coated the floor remained undisturbed. This was confusing news to Sokol’s co-workers, who had used a selfie stick to raise a phone up to the window of the attic and captured a dark and blurry picture that showed the reflection of two eyes. But when they went to show the police the photo, it was gone from the phone.

Virtually every business in the area has similar spooky stories, Sokol learned when she asked the people in these places to share. The employees at the salon around the corner from the soda shop told Sokol about the ghost they believe haunts the space. They have named her Myrtle. Sokol showed me the Sorenson home, once occupied by a woman named Martina. Martina enjoyed sitting in her yellow rocking chair and listening to baseball games on the radio up until her death in 1954. Years later, some teens attempted to break into the Sorenson home, but were deterred when they spotted the silhouette of a woman in a rocking chair, and heard the faint sounds of a baseball game.

But it was in the small cemetery between many of the houses-turned-businesses where Sokol shared the town’s spookiest stories. There were stories of teen troublemakers taunting spirits and regretting it when a malevolent spirit allegedly revealed itself. Stories of visions of the deceased at vigils and bright images in the sky. The most unsettling story, however, had no supernatural elements, but instead revealed how gruesome history is on its own.

Moroni Clawson was murdered and initially buried in the Salt Lake City Cemetery. His body at the time was unidentified, so a kind-hearted police officer purchased clothes for Clawson to be buried in. When Clawson’s brother later claimed the body and requested to have it moved to Draper, officials exhumed the coffin. And they were startled to find Clawson’s body unclothed within.

Clawson had been the latest victim of the grave robber Jean Baptiste. A search of Baptiste’s home revealed he had been robbing graves for years, and nearly 300 plots were violated, many of them belonging to women and children. Baptiste was exiled to an island in the Great Salt Lake. But the exile didn’t last long before he fashioned a raft out of the door and sides of his shack, escaped and was never seen again. It was a gruesome and upsetting story.

And it numbered among the best I’ve heard on any ghost tour. Because the best ghost tours, led by the best guides, reveal that history doesn’t need any supernatural elements to make our hair stand on end. It’s plenty spooky on its own, so long as it’s presented correctly. And can, sneakily, imbue a respect for the people and places of our towns’ histories. “It makes life special to know the background of the buildings and the people who came before us,” Sokol explained.

“I love history,” Sokol told me. “And I think it’s just so much more palatable and so many more people are interested if there’s a spooky element to it.”

She loves history so much that she’s committed to doing the tour until the day she dies. “I love that it’s accessible,” she said. “I love that I can just say, come to Draper Park at 6:30 the weekend before Halloween and I’ll teach you a little bit about history. I’m an enthusiast.”

Next year, I’m taking everyone I know on the tour with me. Because I think it’s important to know the history of where we live. And it’s fun to feel spooked every once in a while.

Until then, I’ll be watching for updates at @draperhistoricghosttour on Instagram.