There was a brief bit of chaos Tuesday morning at Zuckerberg SF General Hospital when an incarcerated person being held in the jail ward at the hospital escaped custody by climbing through ceiling tiles and trying to crawl away through the bowels of the hospital.
The incident happened around 9:45 am according to Ken Lomba, president of the Deputy Sheriffs' Association, and the inmate — whose identity has not been shared — managed to clamber out of site into the ceiling of the hospital ward.
A brief manhunt ensued, and the individual was back in custody by around 10:30 am. It remains unclear what this person was arrested for, and how far they got in their escape attempt.
FriscoLive415 appears to have been among the first on the scene of the chaos.
Code 4 the Code 33… one escaped psychiatric patient in orange jail clothes is back in custody! https://t.co/zk4JJmrMGn
— FriscoLive415 (@friscolive415) April 23, 2024
The Deputy Sheriffs' Association, the union representing San Francisco Sheriff's Department deputies, used the incident has an excuse to call out the mayor, sheriff, and Board of Supervisors.
"We told you! Short staffed and Exhausted," the union said on X. "If Mayor, Sheriff, BOS don’t fund rapid hiring then [shrug emoji]."
The Sheriff's Department has jurisdiction over county properties including SF General and City Hall.
The SFPD will transport arrested individuals who are in need of medical attention to SF General for treatment before booking into the County Jail, at which point they are handed off to the custody of deputies. And the hospital maintains a special jail ward for this purpose.
The Deputy Sheriffs' Association has been outspoken in recent weeks in blaming Sheriff Paul Miyamoto and city leaders for not staffing up the department.
"Sheriff Miyamoto’s heavy reliance on mandatory overtime has created a toxic environment within the Sheriff’s Office, akin to modern-day slavery," the union wrote on X on Monday.
Last week, we learned that San Francisco's two county jails were on lockdown after a spate of alleged attacks by inmates on deputies. And the deputies' union posted a poll on X suggesting that morale within the department has sunk to a new low.
Previously: Two SF County Jails on Lockdown Amidst Reported Rash of Attacks on Deputies
