SFPOA

It’s an early evening watch with Tenderloin Station Field Training Officer Jordan King and Officer Justin Silvan working uniformed patrol.
This shift was Officer Silvan’s first day of Field Training after graduating from the San Francisco Regional Police Academy.
The officers were responding to a disturbance on a Muni bus that took place at 10th and Market Street. Officer King and Officer Silva arrived at the location, but the Muni driver had already left the scene.

Seems like every time we declare another war on drugs nothing changes. Maybe we have our priorities mixed up. After all, how can we declare a war on drugs when we are helping people using them . . . . Sound bizarre? We think so.
And then you have, only in our great City, “The San Francisco Drug Dealers Union. Wait, really??!! Yes, really.
Not sure exactly what they do . . .
If you find out let us know. In fact there are so many Non-Profits in this City someone should take a look to avoid duplicity. Doncha think?

During the passage of the multiple stories culminated from the Close Encounters column there were many times when investigating officers sure could have used a few more hands to assist several times but were unable to do so because the “extra hands” were also tied up on other situations needing immediate resolution.
That situation should not be permitted.
There is no excuse for having to place any officer in this City in a more dangerous exposure without proper back-up.
The SFPOA has always taken a strong stand as far as officer safety is concerned.

Probably not a good idea to ignite a firecracker in the direction of the police car that’s stopped right next to you but that’s exactly what happened to Officer John Crocket and Officer Gustavo Lopez who were on uniform patrol, driving a marked unit and decided to investigate further. The further investigation resulted in the 2 officers confiscating over 400 pounds of illegal product marked “Explosive Fireworks” costing the vendors of this operation close to a $4 thousand dollar loss!

Leave it to Sergeant Jarrod Yee to start off the New Year with a statistic or two in regards to outstanding work the officers at Bayview accomplish every day.

This time it was Officer Giovanni Leyva, Officer Mariano Flores, and Officer Michael Scherer who captured an individual in the Bayview community driving a stolen car, had two outstanding felony warrants for his arrest and was also armed with a fully-loaded, assault weapon detailed out to function as a ‘ghost gun’ with an extended magazine. And, believe it or not, healso had a pretty good stash of illegal narcotics to boot.

It’s customary to end each Close Encounter article with a careful reminder to “stay safe.” or, even a more sensible “Let’s be careful out there.” an admonishment borrowed from the famous Michael Conrad from the “Hill Street Blues”police-television series a “few” years ago.

But we include such admonishments towards the end of the column to remind officers, and especially the public, of the inherent danger in the job the officers perform.

Especially when it involves guns.

When San Francisco resident Paul Pelosi, the husband of congressional House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was viciously attacked by a hammer-wielding assailant on October 28, 2022, his 9-1-1 call was answered by SF dispatcher Heather Grimes.

The details of that call and of Ms. Grimes’ intuitive action have been covered at length by local media – as it most deservedly should have been. According to comments attributed to Police Chief William Scott, her intuition and quick-thinking resulted in an immediate police response that quite probably saved Mr. Pelosi’s life. I don’t disagree.

What would you possibly have to do to have a $1 million dollar felony warrant issued for your arrest?
Well, in this case the warrant was issued for 2 individuals, 1 male, 1 female, who beat a person within an inch of his life.
The male suspect caused major lacerations to the victim knocking him defenseless on the ground, at which time the female suspect continued the assault by kicking the victim in the head.

It’s sunset in the Mission District and Officer Gustavo Lopez and his partner, Officer Diego Rodriquez-Ortiz were patrolling the Dolores Park neighborhood when they were approached by a woman who was screaming hysterically in Spanish about someone who had a gun.
Fortunately, both officers were Spanish-speaking and realized the woman was pointing at an individual who was running away from the park who, she explained, had just pointed a gun at another person, putting it to his head while trying to rob him.