Hot off the heels of last year's big SFPD crime lab snafu and subsequent investigation revealing that 61 officers had conduct issues, Public Defender Jeff Adachi announced another case of police misconduct at a press conference last night.
Several SFPD officers are currently under investigation for allegedly raiding rooms at Henry Hotel at 106 Sixth Street (which is described on Yelp as "one of the cleaner crack houses in San Francisco") during two different drug busts without a warrant and falsifying police reports. The Public Defender's Office has two surveillance videos in its possession, which resulted in both drug cases being dismissed on Monday.
During the first bust that occurred on December 23, the report claims that the officers knocked and announced their presence before walking into the room, where 65.5 grams of heroin and a rock of crack cocaine was found, but the video shows them all walking into the room without knocking, using the master key. They also had one of the defendants sign a consent form after the fact, which should have been signed prior to obtaining access to the room.
Footage from the second bust shows one of the officers covering the camera for fifteen seconds, and one of the defendants later testified that she was forced to open the door to her room, which contained fifteen grams of heroin.
District Attorney George Gascón, who was police chief when the incidents occurred, said his office will be investigating the case.
