Today in ACAB

5 months ago
Scott Neu, a former sheriff's deputy who was fired in 2015 for allegedly forcing jail inmates to fight each other, and costing the city some $280,000 in settlements, is being rehired by the Sheriff's Office.

Though Neu was criminally charged by former District Attorney George Gascón in 2016 with 17 criminal counts, these charges were dropped after the Sheriff's Office allegedly destroyed evidence in the case; in one instance an investigator's laptop was smashed with a hammer due to a virus.

Neu is being reinstated to his former position -- in which he worked in the county jail -- the City Attorney's Office confirmed today.

The reinstatement comes after Neu and the deputy sheriffs' union in 2021 successfully compelled the city to participate in binding arbitration regarding his firing. The use of this alternative to the court system is written into the union's contract with the city. Neu's appeal hearing was held in August 2023, and the arbitrator overseeing it subsequently opted to reduce his termination to a 90-day suspension.

The arbitrator's decision is binding, and the city is legally obligated to comply with it.

Jail detainee Quincy Lewis in 2018 received a $60,000 settlement after he alleged that Neu forced him to fight other inmates, gamble, or do pushups for food. Ricardo Palikiko-Garcia was in 2016 paid $90,000 in a settlement over his case alleging that he was forced to fight a fellow inmate for food by Neu and other deputies, who took bets on winners.

Neu allegedly told inmates to say they fell off their bunk if they got injured during the fights, and threatened to beat or mace the inmates to compel them to fight, Gascón said at the time.

But before the "fight club" cases, Neu was also accused of sexual assault by detainees David Spears, Sabrina Wigfall, and Kyle Adams between 2004 and 2008. The city settled their suits for a total of $95,000. And in 2006, Neu was accused of punching and kicking an inmate in his cell, leaving him with two broken ribs, but was not disciplined or criminally charged.

Public Defender Mano Raju:

The fact that Neu will be back at his old job and in a position to potentially engage in the same violent and abusive behavior is deeply disturbing, and it's a slap in the face to our clients and their families who bravely reported his abuses years ago. This reinstatement illustrates that members of law enforcement agencies are effectively immunized from any meaningful consequences for their misconduct because of protections under state law and local policies they have obtained through heavy lobbying. This must end.

For the sake of our clients, their families, and the San Franciscans who had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in settlements to Neu's victims, I demand to know what steps the Sheriff is taking to ensure Neu is not in a position to have contact and authority over anyone detained in county jail. The Sheriff can and should recommend Neu for decertification under state law, and I urge the Sheriff Oversight Board and the new Inspector General to take a close look at the department's practices and policies to ensure nothing like this ever happens again.

We encourage the public to view the extensive investigative materials our office has collected on Neu in our Cop Monitor database, which was specifically created to shine a light on law enforcement misconduct, such as Neu's 'fight club,' that rarely see the light of day.

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Hostile Architecture Survey

6 months ago
The Mission's response to homelessness: More than 2,000 planters:

There are some 2,078 planters across the neighborhood, according to a block-by-block count conducted by Mission Local reporters. About 200 of these are the large metallic containers and another 400 are wooden barrels. There are 155 wooden troughs. The remaining 1,307 are a mixture of receptacles ranging in size from tiny clay pots to massive sidewalk gardens filled with an assortment of vessels.

Kudos to the web designers for making this article be both: an interactive scrolling 3d-ish map thingy; and also, completely legible in Reader Mode! One usually does not get both.

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"Just one more lane bro, bro I swear just one more lane and it'll fix the traffic bro"

7 months ago
A little girl was run over and killed at a location where Caltrans and SFCTA now want to pump in more high-speed traffic through a freeway ramp widening. Then they wonder why Vision Zero is failing.

SFCTA Senior Engineer Jielin Pan's presentation stated the project goals are to "move people more efficiently, increase trip reliability, enhance travel choices, reduce emissions, support community well-being, and contribute to a regional network." Despite this statement, SFCTA seems intent on widening the highway in order to encourage more San Mateo and Santa Clara County residents to drive to S.F. instead of taking Caltrain, which sits immediately adjacent to the proposed widening.

Also immediately adjacent to the location: the spot where a child was run over and killed by a turning driver last August.

Advocates have been gaining strength in their opposition to the widening. Recently, the Sierra Club Bay Chapter, San Francisco League of Conservation Voters, San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, and San Mateo County Supervisor & MTC Commissioner Dave Canepa, and the South San Francisco City Council have opposed the widening proposals.

Here's the petition in opposition to the widening.

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Cruse CEO resigns, to spend more time being dragged under his family's car

8 months ago

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Once again, "AI" is revealed to be an army of mechanical turks in a call center.

8 months ago
Cruse "autonomous"vehicles require 1.5 drivers, and manual intervention every two and a half miles:

Half of Cruise's 400 cars were in San Francisco when the driverless operations were stopped. Those vehicles were supported by a vast operations staff, with 1.5 workers per vehicle. The workers intervened to assist the company's vehicles every 2.5 to five miles, according to two people familiar with is operations. In other words, they frequently had to do something to remotely control a car after receiving a cellular signal that it was having problems. [...]

When Mr. Vogt spoke to the company about its suspended operations on Monday, he said that he did not know when they could start again and that layoffs could be coming, according to two employees who attended the companywide meeting. [...]

Cruise employees worry that there is no easy way to fix the company's problems, said five former and current employees and business partners, while its rivals fear Cruise's issues could lead to tougher driverless car rules for all of them.

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Current Music: Craig Wedren & Anna Waronker -- How Could It Not Have Been? ♬

Happy They Live day to all who celebrate

8 months ago
35 years ago today, They Live debuted at #1 at the box office. In honor of my favorite documentary about the Reagan administration, here are some highlights from my OBEY tag:

2016, just before the election:

They Live and the secret history of the Mozilla logo:

One of my most popular posts of all time.

"I'm going to draw a line through 1930s agitprop, Ronald Reagan, methane-breathing zombie space aliens, the Mozilla logo, Barack Obama and the International Commiunist Conspiracy. It's a long walk, so please stick with me."

I ended with, "In this upcoming presidential election, please vote against the methane-breathing zombie space alien."

Reader, my supplication did not work.

2016, just after the election:

Bubble Failure:

I wore my They Live costume, including the "MAKE AMERICA OBEY AGAIN" hat, and some guy -- in San Francisco, at a DNA Lounge synthwave event -- thought I was not joking and straight up admitted that he voted for Trump.

And another guy told me I was "brave" for wearing it, and that he threw away his vote for some third candidate whose name I don't even recognize any more, "Because Hillary? Is like corrupt? Or something?"

When I heard that 9.7% of San Francisco voted for Trump, I was puzzled, because does San Francisco even have that many cops?

2018: They Fake:

"Please point me at software that will replace all the faces in a video with skinless, methane-breathing space zombies."

Nobody did. As a team, you have all failed me, and us all.


2018: Real-life Hoffman lenses. It's a start.


2019: Halloween, Night Five:

I dressed as a centrist.

"See, my dress shirt isn't white, it's actually light purple! That's how you can tell I say things like 'socially liberal but fiscally conservative' and 'I'd really like to meet Elon Musk some day'."

2021: They Loki:

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Current Music: Metric -- Doomscroller ♬

Today in Applied Demonology

8 months ago
A cone-ven of witches casting spells onto self-driving cars

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APEC Billionaire Party is going to be a shitshow

8 months ago
Opposition grows to Breed's APEC boosterism:

"APEC is going to further highlight the huge gap between those with power and money and those of us who are just trying to get by," Casey said.

Advocates for undocumented immigrants testified that many workers who have jobs in the security zone will be afraid to go to work, because San Francisco's Sanctuary City policies don't apply to the Secret Service. "They are worried about being arrested," a representative of PODER said.

"There are a lot of people who don't have ID and can't get through the checkpoints," one speaker said.

"Immigrant communities are bracing themselves to stay home for seven days," a speaker from PODER noted. That means kids won't go to school, parents won't go to work, food won't be available for seniors.

Some SoMa business owners say the summit will destroy them:

Though the city isn't mandating any business closures per se, several owners I spoke with fear the summit will deal fatal damage to businesses that are already struggling due to the depletion of San Francisco's downtown office scene. These owners say they have been frustrated with what they consider to be a total lack of communication, preparation and support from city government.

"Once the perimeter is up, we will need to close," said restaurant owner Manuel Ramirez, who operates a Bonchon restaurant in the Metreon, which is in the exclusion zone. There's no way for this to work logistically, he says, especially for a business that relies on deliveries. "Even if we could operate, how would our staff get here? Will they come an hour early and line up at the checkpoints? Are delivery drivers willing to stop three blocks away to pick up food?" [...]

Sanchez said his bar, a block away from Moscone Center and in the exclusion zone, typically arranges conference-related buyouts three to six months in advance. Dreamforce and other conferences tend to work out well for Executive Order. Yet, despite signing the bar up as an APEC-ready event space via official channels, he's received "not one peep" so far, a signal that the bar will have to, absurdly, rely on foot traffic during a week when most locals likely will avoid the area. [...]

The resolution -- the legislative equivalent of a strongly worded suggestion -- also noted that some of the $10 million in reserved APEC funds, likely earmarked for police overtime pay, could help lessen the economic burdens the neighborhood will suffer.

Even if the resolution passes, however, it's up to Mayor London Breed and her city departments to tear their focus away from party planning to help the people who will be hurt by APEC.

Check out that sweet Bicycle Exclusion Zone:

This is going to be as great for the city as the superbowl was, and by "the city" I mean our Grifter In Chief London Breed.

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Murderbot reprieve

8 months ago
Cruise Self-Driving License Revoked After It Withheld Pedestrian Injury Footage.

Cruise, one of two autonomous vehicle companies offering fully driverless taxi rides in the U.S., has had its license revoked by the California Department of Motor Vehicles because it withheld video footage from an ongoing investigation and "the manufacturer's vehicles are not safe for the public's operation," the DMV said in a statement. [....]

In the Order of Suspension, the California DMV said that the Cruise vehicle initially came to a hard stop and ran over the pedestrian. After coming to a complete stop, it then attempted to do a "pullover maneuver while the pedestrian was underneath the vehicle." The car crawled along at 7 mph for about 20 feet, then came to a final stop. The pedestrian remained under the car the whole time.

The day after the incident, DMV representatives met with Cruise to "discuss the incident." During that meeting, Cruise only showed footage up to the first complete stop, according to the Order of Suspension. No one at Cruise told the officers or showed any footage of the subsequent pullover maneuver and dragging. The DMV only learned of that from "another government agency."

I guess it's a "drag someone around and find out" kind of situation.


Update: "Cruise Immediately Halts All Robotaxis Nationwide, Seeks To ‘Rebuild Trust’." Translation: "We found out that other permit revocations were in the pipeline so we want to control the narrative."

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Vacancy tax

9 months ago
San Francisco passes strongest vacant housing speculation tax:

This week, San Francisco formalized a voter-approved law, also known as Proposition M, to crack down on owners of multifamily units that let them sit vacant. The law, which goes into effect in January, could push as many as 7,000 units on the market, according to city estimates -- that would be literally 90% of the city's homeless getting housed, based on the above data.

Ok, there's a "then a miracle happens" step missing in the middle, there.

I'm in favor of vacancy taxes, and if they cause landlords to lower prices such that units that were sitting empty are now being occupied, that's very helpful. But it's quite a walk from that to "and now 90% of the homeless are in those apartments".

"The primary purpose of the law is to fill empty homes," supervisor Dean Preston, the law's chief backer, told Fortune Friday. "Holding housing off the market for a long time, when there are people who need housing, is bad for our city," he said. "Our hope is that [the tax] is enough to change the decision making of the real-estate speculator or the owner of the property." [...]

But real-estate interests are already fighting the law in state court, claiming their right to not rent their property is enshrined in the Constitution. [...] "The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that property-owners' power to exclude [others from the property] has traditionally been considered one of the most treasured strands in an owner's bundle of property rights," the lawsuit argues. [...]

Apartments may sit empty because of high crime or few jobs in the area, but their owners may be loath to drop their asking rent for fear that rent control laws wouldn't let them raise it in the future, the suit says.

Don't threaten me with a good time.

Under the vacancy tax, owners would be on the hook for $2,500 to $5,000 per empty unit, depending on its size -- an amount that increases every year it's left unoccupied. An empty building of 10 mid-sized apartments (1,000 to 2,000 square feet) would incur a tax of $140,000 by its third year, and the amount would then be indexed to the federal Consumer Price Index.

The tax is directed to fund affordable-housing programs, Preston said, but added that "raising money is not the primary purpose of this measure."

"If 10,000 units get filled in the next few years, we'll be happy even if there's little to no tax revenue," he said.

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