The SFPD arrest of a hot dog vendor who was slammed to the ground and held down made a splash in the local news. But both sides are now going public with their own versions of events, which unsurprisingly, do not quite match.
Mission Local was the first to report on a Sunday incident where a bacon-wrapped hot dog cart vendor was thrown to the ground and handcuffed in front of a screaming, crying child that appeared to be her daughter. Video of the incident has been up on YouTube for three days and is seen below. It’s difficult to watch, not just because of what seems like excessive force to cite an unpermitted hot dog cart proprietor, but because a little girl that appears to be the woman’s daughter is screaming in hysterical trauma over the sight of the arrest.
Yet we don’t know what transpired before the video was shot, and new information is now coming from both sides. For their part, KGO tracked down the hot dog vendor in question, now identified as Ana Luisa Casimir Julca. KGO also reports that the young girl in the video is indeed Casimir Julca’s five-year-old daughter, and has different video of the incident that appears to have been shot by other bystanders.
“My whole head, everything, bruised,” Casimir Julca told KGO, through an interpreter. “How is it possible they did this to me?”
But in response to increased media coverage of the incident, the SFPD is telling their side of the story.
SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT 🧵
— San Francisco Police (@SFPD) September 11, 2024
A video that has gained widespread attention on social media showing SFPD officers arresting a woman Sunday morning along the Embarcadero appears to be an orchestrated effort by people illegally vending hot dogs to undermine the city’s efforts to…
They say the woman was given a warning to knock off her unpermitted vending operation at 10:30, and an hour later city agency staff found her still there and vending. SFPD added in a Monday night Twitter thread that “The edited video cut out important details leading up to the arrest – specifically that the woman being arrested had committed a battery on an employee with the SF Port and repeatedly obstructed and resisted officers.”
They also allege that the incident was, to some degree, staged. “A witness on scene even told SFPD officers that someone in the group told a small child to begin crying near the officers to manipulate the situation,” the department says. “A witness at the scene told police that an unidentified woman pushed the child ‘toward the police and told her to cry so that the police will let her mom go,’ according to the police report of the incident.”
Illegal vending is an ongoing challenge that San Francisco is working hard to address.
— San Francisco Police (@SFPD) September 11, 2024
San Francisco is committed to ensuring the safety and well-being of its dedicated workforce. The city unequivocally affirms its right and responsibility to protect its employees from any form…
SFPD adds that “the woman ran back to the cart, grabbed it and struck [a] Port worker,” which would seem to merit an arrest. And they say that even when she was on the ground, “the woman continued to hold her arms under her and resisted being detained.”
So they’re trying to limit the amount of sympathy that’s been generated toward the hot dog cart vendor, and add skepticism by saying the scene was somewhat staged. But they might have undermined that goal, and created more sympathy for the vendor Casimir Julca, with another part of that tweet thread.
“Due to the fact that someone on scene allegedly pushed her toward her mom in an apparent attempt influence the situation,” the department tweeted, “SFPD officers contacted Family Child Services to notify them about the incident.”
Image: @rayfilwong via Twitter
