Off-duty St. Cloud police officer dies days after collision with Twin Cities transit bus

An off-duty St. Cloud police officer has died days after he was critically injured in a crash with a suburban transit bus on a Twin Cities highway.

Officer Ryan Ebert, 44, died Saturday morning at HCMC surrounded by family, St. Cloud police chief Jeff Oxton said in a statement.

“Ryan continued serving others as he left this life by giving others a chance to live through donating organs as his final act,” Oxton said. “Ryan’s dedicated 18 years of service to the citizens of St. Cloud will always be appreciated and remembered. We at the St. Cloud Police Department are honored to have known and worked with Ryan and will always miss his presence.”

The crash occurred shortly before 10 p.m. Monday on northbound Hwy. 77 just south of Interstate 35E in Apple Valley, according to the State Patrol.

Ebert, 44, of Big Lake, was taken by emergency medical responders to HCMC.

A representative of Ebert’s family disputed the patrol’s claims that suspected alcohol use by Ebert was a factor in the crash. The representative provided documentation to the Minnesota Star Tribune that said his blood alcohol content was 0.009%, a negligible amount well under the legal limit for driving.

According to a search warrant affidavit filed by the State Patrol in Hennepin County District Court, a trooper approached the pickup in the median and noticed an “obvious odor of alcohol” coming from Ebert, who was unconscious. Emergency medical personnel also detected “a strong odor of alcohol” from him while he was in the ambulance, the filing continued.

St. Cloud Police Chief Jeff Oxton told the Minnesota Star Tribune on Friday that he has also seen Ebert’s medical records, which were provided to him by the officer’s family. Oxton said in a statement: “Toxicology from blood samples taken by medical staff upon Ryan’s arrival at the hospital indicate that he had a very small or trace-amount of alcohol in his system, significantly below that which would ever lead to a person being considered impaired or driving under the influence.”

Oxton’s statement added that the patrol’s preliminary assessment released a few hours after the crash “may lead one to assume otherwise.”

Patrol Sgt. Troy Christianson declined Friday to say more about the agency’s initial news release or the search warrant affidavit about the crash “because it is an open investigation.”

The driver of the Minnesota Valley Transit Authority bus, 65-year-old Phillip Alan Wright of Apple Valley, was slightly injured, the patrol said.