News and Press Releases

SF’s failed ‘War on Drugs’ needs innovation to transform the status quo by Hadi Razzaq, Managing Attorney for the Investigation Unit of the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office San Francisco has historically responded to street-level drug activity in the same way: periodically cracking down on low-level drug sellers by ramping up policing. But arresting and imprisoning people who sell drugs...

Op Ed by Danielle Harris – Director of Public Integrity for the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office Published by the San Francisco Examiner on September 13, 2019 Our mental health crisis is not a tragedy waiting to happen, as some would have it. The tragedies are happening, have happened, and continue to happen. They are stacking up one on top of...

SAN FRANCISCO – Robert Chan, an attorney for the family of Jeff Adachi, is releasing three independent reports that raise serious questions about Jeff Adachi’s autopsy, which was conducted by the San Francisco Medical Examiner’s Office (OCME) in March 2019. The independent reviews found the cause of death was “sudden cardiac arrhythmia and acute myocardial infarction due to coronary artery...

The vote to close down juvenile hall was a historic moment in juvenile justice reform. I am excited and proud to be part of the movement to re-envision this system. These institutions are not rehabilitative. The racial disparities are stark, and the confines of juvenile halls have a harmful effect on youth’s mental and physical health as well as their...

San Francisco– Representatives from the Public Defender’s Office will be advocating for the release of previously sealed police personnel files during Wednesday evening’s Police Commission meeting, Deputy Public Defender Jacque Wilson has announced. “Law enforcement in San Francisco is deliberately sandbagging the release of these records,” said Wilson. “But we are pushing back just as hard. We’ve filed a Sunshine...