Backlash against SFPD response to 'hill bomb' skateboard event continues, body-cam footage released

SAN FRANCISCO - Demonstrators held a rally at San Francisco City Hall ahead of Wednesday's Police Commission meeting where the police response to illegal fireworks in the Mission and to the Dolores ‘Hill Bomb’ skating event were discussed. 

At the unsanctioned skateboarding event, 80 minors and 30 adults were arrested, but the fallout from the police response continues. 

Last week, San Francisco Police Department Chief of Police, William Scott, said his department would release video of the event this week. Police and city officials have so far defended the police response.  

Others, including the city's public defender, have called the police response heavy-handed, militarized and that people's rights were violated. 

Earlier today, Chief Scott said the investigation into the skateboarding event is not over. At the meeting, he came through with the body-camera video. He showed people participating in launching fireworks at officers. "The kinds of explosives that officers were facing are extremely dangerous," said Scott. The video captures audio of police giving the crowd dispersal orders at 7:19 p.m. 

Scott also showed footage of the crowd vandalizing Muni vehicles. Bottles and cans were also thrown at officers. Police said they spent more than an hour ordering the crowd to disperse and that the arrests were their last resort. 

During the meeting, Scott said it was possible that some people may have been caught up in the moment. "But what I will say is this: The admonition, the dispersal order was read repeatedly. The group remained was still violent, was still destroying property," said Scott. 

But on the steps of City Hall, activists decried the reporting from one local outlet that the SFPD response to the event cost tens of thousands of dollars. One speaker acknowledged the $70,000 in damages to a Muni bus that was tagged. However, it was characterized as "the result of youth that were encroached upon by the police presence." 

After asking the crowd to repeat after him that "skating is not a crime," a speaker at the rally said the skateboarding event was a missed economic opportunity that could have been sanctioned with vendors. Some activists said the continuing investigation will amount to a waste of dollars. Mayor London Breed had previously said she's open to the idea of working with skateboarders to recreate the event, but with safety guidelines in place. 

"We have heard zip from the Department of Police Accountability," said Jeffrey Kwong with the Harvey Milk LGBTQ Democratic Club. "If there's one group that the police should be trained to deescalate, it's with the youth." Instead, Kwong said the youth were met with rubber bullets and police officers who ran down the streets with batons. He added that those who were detained and arrested had their constitutional rights infringed upon when they were allegedly kept without due process. Kwong is calling for the Police Commission to open an independent investigation. 

Kwong thanked Supervisor Shamann Walton's office for helping organize with the Harvey Milk club and called for all the police body-camera video from the ‘Hill bomb’ debacle to be released by SFPD, "not a snippet." 

Rachel Lederman, a civil rights attorney with Partnership Civil Justice Fund, said she's been speaking with dozens of families of the youth and some of the young adults who were arrested that night. 

"I'm horrified and appalled that SFPD saw fit to conduct this type of sweep, mass arrest in which children, as well as some adults, were simply blocked in, had no opportunity to leave. Many never heard an order from police or were trying to comply when they were corralled, kettled into a block and then held for hours," Lederman said. 

Lederman had previously told KTVU she is considering filing a lawsuit against those who were detained. At the rally she reiterated she is discussing civil litigation with the families of those arrested, calling their arrests "unlawful." 

She noted that no definitive statement on this case has been issued by either District Attorney Brooke Jenkins, nor juvenile probation that these cases are being dropped. "The families are being told all different things about that," Lederman said. She added that some of the youth, who have never been in trouble with the law before, but who were arrested, have serious charges hanging over their heads. 

"Those of us with legal background know that it's extremely unlikely that these cases are going to be charged," said Lederman. 

During the Commission meeting, one of several youths spoke out during public comment. "I don't understand why they, the police treated us the way they did, said Max Reyes of San Bruno. 

"We were not allowed to call our parents if our phone was dead," said another youth who was detained. 

Chief Scott acknowledged during processing of those arrested and detained that there were delays, including in making contact with parents. "We own that too," he said. 

A "Hill-bomb mom," only identified as Lisa, was introduced at the rally. She said on the evening of Saturday, July 8, she and some of her 15-year-old son's friends were having dinner at 8 p.m. The family lives near Dolores Park, but she did not know about the unsanctioned event. She said her son asked permission to see some other friends. Whey she gave him the OK, they got on their scooters and headed out. 

"They got to the crowd and at that point there was a row of police men. They asked the police men, ‘Where should we go?’" said Lisa. She said the police told them to go "that way," which was in the direction of police in riot gear. At around 8:45 p.m. She said all three were detained. "They were told to stay. They were not allowed to call us. They were zip tied and he was forced to stay with a group of kids…until one o'clock in the morning." 

She described the conditions including the fact that there were no bathrooms available. "Kids peed in buckets. Girls peed their pants. No water. No food. At some point they were forced to stand up and at one o'clock in the morning a Muni bus came and took them to be booked."

Lisa said she still had received no call from her teenaged son and had no idea where he was. "He was supposed to be home between 11:30 and 12," she said. Lisa said she became frantic and thought her son's phone was stolen at 17th Street, which was along the route her son took to the park. "Then I saw his phone had been moved to the San Francisco Police Department and that's when I became even more scared." 

Lisa said a call from SFPD came at 3:15 a.m. that she could pick up her son. "No kid should be treated like an animal, no matter how you feel about what happened," she said. "San Francisco Police Department has policies to treat juveniles a certain way and they did not follow those policies." She is calling for an investigation into why SFPD did not follow protocol and why they were not better prepared with de-escalation tactics with this regularly occurring unofficial event.