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San Francisco’s District Attorney has blasted criminal courts for ‘freeing drug dealers’ and judges for not taking the fentanyl crisis seriously.
DA Brooke Jenkins ripped into the courts system during a public safety town hall meeting earlier this week as the city continues to battle an opioid-fueled crime epidemic.
Alongside a panel including Police Chief Bill Scott and Sheriff Paul Miyamoto, Jenkins said that arrests for drug dealings are up, and her office has requested that repeat offenders be detained while awaiting trial, with little being granted.
Jenkins said: ‘The courts are the biggest barrier. We do everything we can and you can see the same person out on the street the same day.
‘Repeat and chronic offenders are selling the most deadly substance we’ve seen in this city.’
District Attorney Brooke Jenkins speaks at a press conference outside City Hall in San Francisco on Thursday, June 8, 2023
The California city is currently dealing with a major opioid crisis, which is fueling a rise in crime also
‘That tells you something about what has been going on in the courtrooms of this city,’ Jenkins continued. ‘The judges are not taking this seriously. The judges are ignoring it.
‘It’s taking four open cases — so that means the police have to arrest the same person four times on average before the court will agree to hold them in custody,’ she added.
The panel had been met with more than 100 people who crammed into a meeting room at the St. Anthony Foundation in the city.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported that prior to the meeting a man was critically wounded in the Tenderloin area, which had been the topic of discussion for the panel.
Business owner Del Seymour told the meeting: ‘We got seniors that can’t or won’t come outside. We got children that can’t play outside anymore. We want our neighborhood back.’
The city has struggled for years with rampant fentanyl use and fatal overdoses, and is on pace for its deadliest year yet.
There were 647 accidental drug overdose deaths in San Francisco in 2022, and over 70 percent of those deaths were attributable to fentanyl, according to the San Francisco Office of the Chief Medical Examiner.
In the first five months of 2023, preliminary reports show there were 346 overdose deaths in the city – an increase of more than 40 percent from the same period in 2022.
More than 79 percent of those deaths were attributable to fentanyl, according to data from the medical examiner’s office.
The panel had met inside the St Anthony Foundation to discuss public safety amid soaring crime and drug problems
The city has struggled for years with rampant fentanyl use and fatal overdoses, and is on pace for its deadliest year yet
Open drug use is now common in the city, something which the police are cracking down on
Earlier this year, democratic Mayor London Breed launched the police operation against open-air drug use across the California city which has been hit with an opioid-fueled crime epidemic.
Despite their efforts, over 70,000 residents have fled San Francisco since the start of the pandemic to escape the crumbling city’s drug and crime crisis.
Due to the ongoing problems the city is dealing with, the city is currently dealing with a retail exodus, with tourism also down.
Westfield shopping center announced it had stopped making mortgage payments due to crime and tanking sales – defaulting on its $558million loan and handing it back to the lender.
This was sparked by the decision from Nordstrom, the mall’s anchor tenant, to close this month – which Westfield blamed in large part on ‘unsafe conditions’ and a ‘lack of enforcement against rampant criminal activity’.
This map shows a small selection of the big-name departures who have decided to vacate the city
Other major firms such as Banana Republic, Office Depot, Old Navy, H&M and Whole Foods Market have either left the area or announced plans to leave in the coming months.
In June, Park Hotels & Resorts announced it was stopping mortgage payments on two hotels, the 1,921-room Hilton San Francisco and the 1,024-room Park 55, saying: ‘Now more than ever, we believe San Francisco’s path to recovery remains clouded and elongated by major challenges.’
