Former SF Sheriff's Office chief of staff Richard Jue got lucky with a diversion program sentence rather than having to stand trial for a March hit-and-run where he lied to investigators, and the Chronicle just obtained video of the crash.

We learned in June that SF Sheriff Paul Yamamoto’s chief of staff Richard Jue had hit another car and fled the scene while driving in an incident that had actually secretly occurred in March. Days later, it came out that Jue was not only driving a city-owned vehicle when he crashed into the parked Tesla, but he lied to sheriff’s office investigators who were following up on the incident. Jue was booked on two misdemeanor charges, released on $7,500 bond, and placed on administrative leave.  

Today it’s becoming public that Jue was allowed to retire, likely preserving his pension should he be found guilty on any of those charges. But the Chronicle reports that Jue will not even stand trial on those charges anyway, because a judge gave him a diversion program instead of making him stand trial. That Chronicle report also has surveillance video of the crash itself, which shows a pedestrian almost being hit by the Tesla that Jue crashed into.  

The Chronicle also got ahold of that pedestrian. She said police and sheriff’s deputies had never even contacted her as part of their investigation. She added that she was “pissed” that Jue just drove away, without even leaving a note for the owner of the Tesla that he had just totaled.

We see Jue above embracing DA Brooke Jenkins, and per the Chron, he was apparently a small-time Jenkins donor (he gave $150 to her 2024 reelection campaign). So there are bound to be questions about whether the fix was in.

The investigation itself will raise more of those questions. That investigation was not handled by the SFPD, who would normally investigate a hit-and-run, but instead by the very SF Sheriff's Office where Jue was a top-level employee. Jue would have outranked any of the deputies investigating him.

And Jue gave those investigators several different versions of his story. Yes, he reported the crash that night, but claimed that another vehicle had struck his vehicle while he was sitting in a restaurant. (A deputy who interviewed Jue said his “thoughts were all over the place.”)

According to the Chronicle, Jue then intervened and requested that no report be filed. A full two weeks after his original interview, Jue admitted to the investigators that he was the hit-and-run driver, telling some convoluted story involving a phone alert that went off, and having to use the bathroom really badly.

“He pulled over, stopped, and intended to provide information to the owner of the vehicle, which was unoccupied,” Jue’s attorney Bill Fazio wrote in the diversion request, per the Chron. “However, at this time his abdominal pain increased, and he felt a compelling urge to use the restroom.”

The request worked, and Jue got his diversion instead of a trial last month. The diversion program requires he complete a driver’s safety course, perform 40 hours of community service, not be arrested again for some period of time, and pay the Sheriff’s Office $15,000 in restitution for the city-owned vehicle he damaged.

And the Chronicle called Jue to ask him about the female pedestrian who was nearly hit in the accident, and who was not interviewed by law enforcement even though she witnessed the crash pretty closely. As the Chronicle sums it up, “‘I don’t know what woman you are talking about,’ Jue said. He then hung up.”

Related: SF Sheriff’s Brother-In-Law Alleged to Have Been Growing Marijuana and Smoking It In County Jail [SFist]

Image: San Francisco Sheriff’s Office via Facebook