The San Francisco Public Defender’s Office released previously unseen video surveillance footage of what happened the morning of March 17, 2021, at UN Plaza, when SF Defender client Steven Jenkins was arrested for hitting Xiao Zhen Xie at the corner of Market and 7th Streets. KTVU’s Andre Torrez reports on the video showing Mr. Jenkins as the victim of an unprovoked attack by multiple unknown parties where he sustained 45 hits, including multiple blows to the head, moments prior to his encounter with Ms. Xiao.
As Deputy Public Defender Eric McBurney explains in his press statement:
“Based on the facts that I have reviewed, I do not believe that Mr. Jenkins’s actions were racially motivated. On that day, Mr. Jenkins himself was the victim of an unprovoked attack by four unknown assailants who struck him over forty times immediately before he was seen striking Mr. Pham and Ms. Xiao. Due to the initial attack, Mr. Jenkins suffered multiple head injuries, and I believe that he was in a diminished mental state, and disoriented as a result, when he encountered Mr. Pham and Ms. Xiao just moments later.”
