The San Francisco Police Department's decision to end an agreement to cooperate with District Attorney's Office in police shooting cases couldn’t come at a more tense moment for District Attorney Chesa Boudin, whose progressive policies will face citywide scrutiny in a June 7 recall election.
San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott justified the decision to walk away from an agreement allowing prosecutors to independently investigate police shootings by claiming Boudin's office withheld information from the department. On Wednesday's "Bay Current," KCBS Radio Insider Phil Matier said Scott's withdrawal could have ramifications at the ballot box in four months.
"It was agreed that police shouldn't investigate themselves and that District Attorneys should take the lead in investigations," Matier said of the agreement, which was first struck in 2019 following intense public debate. "San Francisco took this a step further and said that the District Attorney should be the lead investigator in questionable uses of force by a police officer."
Scott backed out of the agreement amid the ongoing case against officer Terrance Stangel, a white man who is on trial facing criminal battery and assault charges for allegedly beating Dacari Spiers, a Black man, with a baton. The San Francisco Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved a $700,000 civil settlement with Spiers, who claims he was unjustly attacked by Stangel.
Stangel's attorney recently argued in court that the criminal charges should be dismissed, after an investigator with the District Attorney's Office testified in a pretrial hearing that she feared retaliation if she didn't withhold information from an affidavit against Stangel.
Stangel and another officer initially responded to a call accusing Spiers of domestic violence against his girlfriend, which Magen Hayashi testified she didn't feel she could include in the affidavit without risking her firing.
"Boudin has been the lead investigator on this case," Matier explained. "But a DA investigator said in court that she felt she had been pressured by the DA's Office to withhold the 911 call about the original domestic violence called in and was in fear she would lose her job."
Following Hayashi's testimony, Scott wrote in a letter to Boudin that his office's investigations of the department often "includes withholding and concealing information and evidence" from police. Boudin said that he is being targeted, and that his office didn't make mistakes investigating and charging Stangel.
San Francisco Superior Court Judge Teresa Caffese, who is overseeing Stangel's criminal trial, said last week the information Hayashi said was withheld wasn't relevant to the officer's case. Testimony in Stangel's trial began on Monday.
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