Subject: San Francisco Police Department

• SFPD Dedicates New Resources to Cold Cases

  September 12, 2007

• Guns and Government: The Snitch's WeekinReview 9.14-9.08

  September 14, 2007

• Bernal Heights Shooting Last Night

  December 6, 2007

• Teen Stabbed In His Sleep At Bustop at 24th and Folsom Wednesday Night

  December 14, 2007

• Gunman Shoots Three While They Sleep Wednesday in Potrero Hill

  February 15, 2008

• Man Shot In Butt While in Cab; Woman Shot in Wrist While In Home

  February 20, 2008

• Urban Etiquette: Graffiti Dos and Don'ts

  March 6, 2008

• SFPD Wants to Get Paid for Getting Dressed

  March 25, 2008

• Do police foot patrols work? San Francisco takes 208 pages to say “We don’t know.”

  April 9, 2008

• The Case of the Missing Heather Fong Letter

  April 17, 2008

• After 14 Years, His SFPD Paperwork is Approved

  July 2, 2008

• San Francisco Police Department Can't Stop Homicides

  November 6, 2008

• SF Cops Nab Dozens of Criminals in Citywide Sweep

  San Francisco Police arrested 39 fugitives on Thursday over a 12-hour period. The citywide sweep targeted high-risk parole and probation violators who were wanted for robbery, narcotics and sexual predator crimes. There were four women among those arrested. The arrests were made as a result of a coordinated effort between numerous agencies including the SFPD, San Francisco Sheriff’s Office and U.S Marshals. “Hopefull crime will go down because of these arrests,” says Sgt. Lyn Tom

  November 14, 2008

• SFPD Report Urges More Tasers, Fewer Dog Bites

  By Peter Jamison The San Francisco Police Commission and the Board of Supervisors' Public Safety Committee are getting together tonight at 6 p.m. in city hall to chew over the findings of an organizational assessment of the city's police department. The analysis, performed by the Police Executive Research Forum, was based on a review of police calls and incident reports, as well as focus groups and interviews with members of the public. What can we expect to learn?

  December 17, 2008

• SFPD Moving to Help Crime Victims in the Country Illegally Get a Visa

  By Lauren SmileyThe San Francisco Police Department has stalled for the better part of 2008 in signing U-visa applications for immigrants in the country illegally who have become the victims of crime. (Read our piece on the wait in this week's paper.) Police said they were just waiting to approve an official policy. Community advocates allege the SFPD fears being held liable for green-lighting anybody to stay in the country in case he or she would commit a future crime - just like juvenile pro

  December 19, 2008

• So How Many Folks Are Nabbed for Yapping on Cell Phones While Driving? Your Guess is as Good as the SFPD's

  Is it possible to be more irresponsible than texting your underaged mistress to score you some drugs while driving a Corvair with infants and kittens wandering in the backseat? While this sort of behavior might make the Examiner blotter, there's no way for the San Francisco Police Department to tabulate how many drivers are texting -- let along chatting on the phone -- while driving. They don't keep track; "Our system is archaic," says a police spokesperson. Waylaying a stagecoach may have its o

  January 14, 2009

• Ring of Fire: Outhouse Arsonist Continues Rampage

  The unknown miscreant or miscreants immolating area outhouses has burned another according to the San Francisco Police Department. A porta-john in the 1200 block of Washington Street went up in the predawn hours; like the other 14 johns torched since November, this is in or near the Russian Hill section of town. The cops' terse press release concludes "No witnesses to this incident. No arrests." The only question remains -- was this the "stealth outhouse"?

  January 14, 2009

• Mission Possible? SFPD Nails 100 Percent of Homicide Suspects in 2009

  Maybe the SFPD ate their Wheaties. Maybe they made a New Year's resolution. But you know that bit about the San Francisco Police Department having one of the worst arrest rates of homicide suspects in the United States? It appears that it's a new day, folks (in the first 16 days of 2009, at least).With an arrest of a laughing, incoherent Peter Fong after he allegedly slit the throat of a sushi restaurant owner on January 7, followed by the Wednesday arrest of Tommy Thomas -- who allegedly stabbe

  January 16, 2009

• Breaking News: French Authorities Conclude De La Plaza Death '100 percent homicide.' S.F. Police Refuse to Read Report

  A formal report recently produced by French investigators and coroners regarding the San Francisco stabbing death of Hugues de la Plaza concludes that the French national's demise was "100 percent homicide," according to his former girlfriend. Melissa Nix was informed of the news by de la Plaza's father, Francois. De la Plaza was found dead in his Hayes Valley apartment in June 2007; the case sparked international attention when the San Francisco Police Department ruled it a suicide despite the

  January 26, 2009

• San Francisco Is the City That Knows How ... To Bust Up Drunken Revelry

  Enjoy the memories. This is done. Whether San Francisco can host a party is a debatable proposition. But when it comes kicking over the soundsystem, flicking on the lights, tossing the lovebirds off the couch, and shutting down the festivities, nobody competes with us. We are so very good at killing a good time. So the news that this year's Bay to Breakers won't be the piss-and-beer-soaked Mardi Gras in running shoes that has come to embody the yearly race was no surprise -- nor was the chorus o

  February 12, 2009

• Father: SFPD's Dogged Insistence Hugues de la Plaza Committed Suicide Is 'Almost Complicity'

  Joe EskenaziFrançois de la Plaza says of the SFPD: "They can still help us toward our objective of finding the murderer. ... There is still a lot to do." Through tightly clenched teeth, François de la Plaza says he still believes the San Francisco Police Department can catch the person who killed his son. Of course, that would require the SFPD to acknowledge that someone did kill François' son -- and admit that the department has been loudly barking up the wrong tree for nearly two years by i

  February 24, 2009

• Father of Hugues de la Plaza Says SFPD Now Considers Case a Murder -- Two Years Later

  Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi addresses the media as François de la Plaza (right) listens in. After nearly two years of pitching François de la Plaza scenarios in which his son, Hugues, stabbed himself three times and then washed the knife or threw it away to never be recovered, the visiting Frenchman informed a crowd of reporters this afternoon  that the San Francisco Police Department has told him they finally agree that his son was murdered. At a Wednesday meeting with SFPD officials "[Cap

  February 26, 2009

• Foreign-Born Dog Soldiers

  September 6, 1995

• San Francisco Arson Case Involving Man With 'Box on Fire' Who Torched Car Grows Weirder and Weirder

  Marvel ComicsAn artist's rendition of San Francico's bizarre vehicular arson case. That artist is, of course, Jack Kirby. How does a reported Monday-morning arson case in which a mysterious man toting a "box on fire" immolating an occupied car get any stranger? How about if the person who fled the burning vehicle for his life morphs into a pair of women and the whole thing becomes an accident? That sounds weirder -- and that's the official line now coming out of the San Francisco Police Departme

  April 1, 2009

• No Sanctuary

  Police slow to help crime victims who are here illegally.

  December 17, 2008

• SF Weekly Letters

  November 19, 2008

• The Chief Is In (for Now)

  With homicide cases going unsolved and morale in the police department sinking, Heather Fong's days as chief may be numbered.

  August 6, 2008

• Image Problem

  Why have SFPD Chief Heather Fong and Mayor Gavin Newsom pursued an overblown pseudo-scandal when there�s so much else on the department�s plate?

  January 3, 2007

• Cops Who SPY

  September 27, 2006

• Lifestyle Check

  A gay ex-cop buys a ranch in Gold Country and finds his own version of Brokeback Mountain

  May 3, 2006

• No. 1 With a Bullitt

  San Francisco's murder rate is at its highest level in a decade. Whose fault is that?

  January 4, 2006

• Toothless Wonder

  Why S.F.'s police watchdog agency has never been effective - and why Prop. H won't change that

  November 12, 2003

• Mob Rule

  Flash mobs: serious social movement or quirky entertainment (or both)?

  July 30, 2003

• Scalp a Ticket, Go to Jail? Basis of San Francisco's Law Odder Than You'd Think.

  It's against the law -- or is it?A soft toss away from the high-legged kick of the Juan Marichal monument outside AT&T Park, an attention-grabbing sign blows in the gentle breeze. In large, alarming letters, the sign warns of the dangers of purchasing scalped tickets -- and notes that both the buyer and seller can be arrested for doing so. And yet, according to the police code cited on the sign (Good Ol' No. 869) scalping is not strictly illegal: This is a code that prohibits folks from sell

  April 21, 2009

• Dead Heat

  Despite the deaths of Aaron Williams and Mark Garcia, the SFPD continues to use pepper spray on suspects who stand a good chance of dying in custody.

  May 15, 1996

• Crushing CRUSH

  November 29, 1995

• How Do You Manage To Get Busted For Drunk Driving Even Though You're In the Back of a Cab? Here's How.

  The San Francisco Police Department has proven that a soused man sitting in the back of a taxi can still be nailed for drunk driving -- provided he irritates his cabdriver enough. A pair of police at Holloway and Arellano Avenues were flagged down by a cabbie early Saturday morning who, according to the subsequent report "stated that the passenger was having him drive around aimlessly." While wasting a cabdriver's time is not a crime, driving under the influence is -- and after the cops ran the

  May 11, 2009

• If the Shoe Fits: Cops Match Crime Scene Bloody Footwear to Shoeless Limping Man

  J'accuse!In a case that comes close to the hypothetical situation of tracking a bleeding elephant in the snow, San Francisco Police have arrested an early contender for "Worst Getaway Attempt" of 2009. Responding Wednesday to a hit-and-run call in the Outer Sunset involving a car bowling over a barricade and then driving off, officers tracked the vehicle to the 1500 block of Great Highway. Examining the vehicle, officers discovered a shoe wedged behind the brake pedal near pools of fresh blood.

  May 15, 2009

• Knowledge Is Power: Cop's Tutorial at Head Shop Results in Big Drug Bust

  Wait, that's not the Uncola!A talkative head shop owner and his eager pupil on the San Francisco Police Department can take credit for a sizable narcotics seizure over in Ingleside.During a recent routine traffic stop, a pair of officers noticed a soda bottle in a plastic bag in the driver's glove compartment when he pulled out his registration. It was then that one of the policemen remembered a neat trick he was shown during a recent work trip to a head shop staffed by a garrulous counterman. T

  June 18, 2009

• Love Given Bad Name In Cross-Bay Relationship Discussion/Demolition Derby

  'It's not you, it's me...' What's more awkward than domestic arguments on public transportation? How about arguments on the Highway Transportation System -- carried out in separate cars via metal-on-metal violence. San Francisco Police officers were called in on Saturday to settle a relationship dispute that may or may not have started with the ominous phrase "We've got to talk" -- but ended with a vehicular chase across the Bay Bridge and car-on-car action apropos of Stephen King's Christine. A

  June 24, 2009

• Man Beaten, Gnawed By Four Robbers -- Who Filch His Sweatshirt

  If you wear a sweatshirt like this, the SFPD cannot guarantee your safetyLike "stupid and clever" the line between "heroism and foolishness" is often very fine. A San Francisco man can ponder that after he chose to fight off a quartet of would-be robbers Tuesday morning and lost his shirt -- literally. Police responded to the 2:13 a.m. call on the 4700 block of Mission and met with a man who "had several bruises and what appeared to be human bite marks." The man told officers he was walking home

  June 25, 2009

• SF Weekly Letters

  July 15, 2009

• Just How Many Cars Have Been Torched In the City? Depends On Whom You Ask.

  www.lcpstc.org​Yesterday we were apparently the first to notice that the term "Arson" coupled with "vehicle" wasn't an inadvertent repetition on the weekend police report, and wrote a small item about a trio of cars going up in flames. Several hours later, the police told us that, in fact, a quintet of cars had been immolated over the weekend -- which raises things from "Hmmmm" to "God damn!" on the news trend scale. Reports that three more cars were torched overnight puts things into "Holy cr

  July 28, 2009

• 'Text-a-Tip' Program Drags SFPD Into 21st Century. SFPD Web Site? Still Vintage 1994.

  The SFPD Web Page induces nostalgia for the 1990s​When Police Chief George Gascon today announces San Francisco cops will soon have the ability to engage in real-time text message conversations with people who have witnessed -- or are witnessing -- a crime, it will be more than a technologically uplifting moment. It also marks one of the few socially redeeming uses for text-messaging. The knock on the SFPD has long been that its hardware and IT systems -- and data compilation -- are more antiq

  August 19, 2009

• You've Been Stung: As Always, Multitude of Drivers Fail to Stop For Undercover Cops Posing as Pedestrians

  ​If you had 38 moving violations in the office pool gauging how many miscreants the Ingleside cops would nail in yesterday's big pedestrian sting -- take a bow! You're the big winner! Between 7 a.m. and noon on Wednesday, San Francisco police officers dinged the aforementioned 38 drivers who failed to yield to a cop posing as a pedestrian, in addition to arresting two drivers for misdemeanors and ordering three cars towed. Highly visible pedestrian stings, it seems, are an excellent way to app

  September 17, 2009

• S.F. Investigators Explain Why Hugues de la Plaza's Cause of Death Remains 'Undetermined'

  In mid-September, attendees at the annual meeting of the National Association of Medical Examiners got to see a detailed, audio-visual presentation aiming to explain why the bizarre 2007 death of French immigrant Hugues de la Plaza was not ruled a murder -- despite protests of friends, family, and French investigators that this was a clear case of homicide.  SF Weekly was there with a video camera. The resulting online video marks the first time San Francisco investigators gave an in-de

  October 7, 2009

• List: How to tell if you're living next to a marijuana grow house

  October 14, 2009

• Police Seek Driver Who Rammed Parking Control Officer Off the Road

  ​The San Francisco Police Department is on the lookout for a silver Acura that barreled through a Parking Control Officer's three-wheeled vehicle at around 3:15 this morning and sent the little car -- and the officer within it -- flying. The collision took place at the intersection of Mission and Third, with the impact occurring northbound on Third; the driver did not stop -- or, apparently, even slow down. The parking control officer received "non life-threatening injuries" according to the S

  October 16, 2009

• Feds complain that S.F.'s sanctuary city policies impeded investigation of Latino gang

  October 21, 2009

• S.F. cops may have gone too far in seizing DJ gear at underground parties

  November 18, 2009