San Francisco Justice: Cop-Killer Gets Probation

If anyone still has any questions about whether this state has even an ounce of sanity left, those questions should be thoroughly squashed as a racist cop-killer gets 5 years probation for killing an SFPD Officer with a shotgun inside a precinct lobby in 1971.


A key defendant in the slaying of a San Francisco police sergeant nearly 40 years ago pleaded guilty Monday to a lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter and will be put on probation for that crime while he continues serving a life sentence for the murder of two New York police officers (uh... how does that work... how can you be on probation while you're in prison?).

Herman Bell made the plea in San Francisco Superior Court, just a week before the start of a preliminary hearing for him and six co-defendants in the death of Sgt. John Young, who was killed during an attack on the San Francisco Police Department's Ingleside Station on Aug. 29, 1971.

Bell said very little during Monday's hearing, other than to answer "yes" to questions posed to him by Judge Philip Moscone concerning whether he was aware of the rights he was waiving. Then Bell said simply, "I plead guilty."

Under terms of the plea deal, Bell will not testify against any of the other defendants in the case, and his guilty plea may not be used as evidence against anyone else.

(So... to recap... for murdering an SFPD Officer, Bell gets probation. In exchange for the lenient sentence he has to do nothing in return.)

Bell's attorney, Stuart Hanlon, said the plea agreement was a victory for Bell (ya think?).

"Mr. Bell was facing life without possibility of parole in a maximum security prison in California if convicted," he said in a press release he distributed after the hearing adjourned. In a previous interview with The Chronicle, Hanlon had said the trial in San Francisco presented a major hardship for his client (oh boo hoo). Bell has a life in the New York prison system, Hanlon said in a previous interview, and living in the San Francisco County Jail was much worse for him.

"His fight for freedom is in New York, where he will continue to fight for parole," Hanlon said Monday. "He has been a model prisoner while in New York, where he has gained several graduate degrees and started programs to help other inmates and the communities from which they come."

(Yup... you heard right... a man who killed two cops and is gunning for parole. So he admits to killing a third, and essentially he gets nothing... the fucking twat is still going to get parole. I would call this a great victory for racist killers everywhere.)

David Druliner, the lead state prosecutor in the case, cited unspecified legal issues and the passage of time in settling the Bell case, saying the plea includes an admission of guilt.

"It's the appropriate plea, under all the circumstances," he said. The manslaughter outcome, he said, includes a statement of acknowledged facts about the events surrounding the death of the police sergeant.

Druliner said the plea is the "first clear statement of guilt" from any of the defendants, who had previously denied guilt and who had alleged that they had been framed.

Hanlon had a different take on the plea.

"If they really believed Herman Bell is the executor of a (San Francisco) cop, how can they give him probation?"

I'll admit Druliner has a point... it might be worth it to finally get an admission of guilt from these racist trash - who, for over 30 years, have been lying and claiming they were "framed" by "the man" - but who were in fact murderers, rapists, and terrorists. And it might be worth it to finally shut up their apologists, who have been spouting the same tired bullshit.

I mean... I understand why a racist cop-killer acts the way he does (he's got nothing to lose, especially in this case)... and I'm beginning to understand how liberals apologize for them. Behind every apologist for a killer - and most death penalty opponents - is a deeply anti-social person whose beliefs are not so much dictated by any real caring for minorities or any real desire for justice - but are in fact motivated by a deep hatred of society and a desire to see innocent people hurt.

The Gun Debate (For Liberals)

Dear Liberal,

It’s time we talk. The debate over gun control is not about guns, it’s about culture, and here is how it works: You point to school shootings and other violence and say that it’s my fault because I support the right to keep and bear arms. I point to violent video games and sociopathic teenagers, and I say the problem is your fault, thanks to inadequately internalized values and morals.

But here’s the thing: Between guns and culture, only one thing has changed. Weapons have been in the hands of man since time immemorial. There is nothing special about semi-automatic “assault weapons.” In fact, until 1934 people could go out and buy fully automatic Thompson submachine guns, hand grenades or just about any other implement of destruction they could afford.

Admittedly, there were a limited number of mafia “hits” in which those weapons were used by unsavory characters to snuff out other unsavory characters. But I defy you to find a single instance in which a child of the 1930s took Daddy’s “Tommy Gun” to school and shot up his classroom.

We can debate merits of the 1960s another time (with pleasure), but I think we can both agree that, as a cultural standard, the innocence of “Leave It to Beaver” pretty much went the way of the dinosaur by the time of the 1968 Democratic National Convention.

Now that the flower children are all grown up (sort of) and produced self-esteem-dependent, atheistic children of their own, we are shocked to discover them to be inadequately socialized. Then, inevitably, they encounter a setback. It could be a romance gone wrong, perhaps rejection by an attractive social group. Whatever the catalyst, equipped with “my” weapons and “your” values, they cut loose on some campus somewhere.

Now, we could go the way of the Brits who, after the Dunblane massacre, banned everything in sight. Unfortunately, in this most perfect of gun control laboratories – an island nation with strict laws and tight borders – the result has been an explosion in crime…and yes, that especially includes gun crime.

It has also led their inadequately socialized post-60s kiddies to stab each other with such alarming regularity that the British have now begun to ban knives, leading us to the sad but inescapable conclusion that Brits can no longer be trusted with sharp objects.

On their present path, the nation of Winston Churchill and the “stiff upper lip” will soon ban running with scissors (if they are allowed scissors at all), and kitchen matches will be the stuff of museums, quite probably under surveillance cameras and armed guard.

Unfortunately, because you are liberal, and because liberalism seems to manifest itself as a pathological obsession to run my life, I can’t reason with you. Therefore, my only choice is to beat you. (Stop cowering: I mean metaphorically, not literally.)

My sole recourse is to marginalize you and reclaim my culture, and that is what I have set about doing. If not me, then my children. If not them, their children. We will make the Thirty Years’ War look like a trifle.

There. We’ve cleared the air. Don’t we all feel just a little better?

Sincerely,

A Conservative

by Paul Valone @ examiner.com

Illegal Alien Killer-gate Update: Ramos To Stand Trial For Triple Murder

Edwin "Babyface" Ramos - illegal alien, MS-13 gangster, and accused mass murderer - will stand trial after a judge waved off a bullshit ploy from the defense.


A San Francisco judge ordered a 22-year-old alleged gang member Monday to stand trial in the slaying of a father and his two sons, citing the testimony of a surviving family member who said he got a good look at the defendant's face as he opened fire on an Excelsior district street.

Ramos' attorney, Marla Zamora, expressed disappointment Monday, saying that her client drove the car carrying the gunman but did not pull the trigger (oh... well then he's a mother-fucking saint!). She said Ramos was not a gang member and had identified the killer, a man whom authorities have been unable to locate.

Ramos showed little reaction as Jackson read off the charges, only whispering to his lawyer.

The murder counts include special circumstances - for multiple killing and for an alleged gang motive - that make him eligible for the death penalty or life in prison without parole if convicted. District Attorney Kamala Harris says she opposes capital punishment (and pretty much any other kind of punishment) and has never sought the death penalty since taking office in 2004.

Tony Bologna's widow sobbed in the front row of the courtroom gallery as the judge announced her decision. Wearing sunglasses and dabbing at her face with tissues, Danielle Bologna reached back and clutched the hand of another family member. After the hearing concluded, she hugged relatives and cried out, over and over, "Thank you, God."

Outside court, prosecutor Harry Dorfman called the killings "a terrible crime. And now we need to go on to the next phase."

Asked about the defense's (bullshit) contention that another man shot the Bolognas, Dorfman said, "I agree with very little of what the defense argued today."

Zamora had strong words for police investigators and prosecutors in her closing remarks, saying, "Either they didn't want to get the real shooter or they felt a bird in the hand was worth two in the bush (maybe they should get O.J on it!)."

Ramos, who remains jailed without bail, was ordered to return to court for arraignment July 13.

A spokeswoman for Harris, Erica Derryck, said after the hearing that the case will be formally reviewed by a team of attorneys in the district attorney's office. They will "consider factors in mitigation and aggravation and make a recommendation to the district attorney" about what sentence to pursue should Ramos be convicted, Derryck said (like it's gonna matter... criminal loving bitch will probably not even push for LWOP).

Ramos had a record as a juvenile before the Bologna killings - a gang-related attack on a Muni passenger and an attempted assault on a pregnant woman, both of which he committed when he was 17.

So the odyssey continues... I hope the Bologna family gets a huge - no, HUMONGOUS - settlement from the City, that Harris' and Newsom's political careers go into the toilet where they belong, and that this City will grow a pair and stop coddling criminals from protected classes.

Just Seeing If You're Awake

I do not necessarily endorse this person's conclusions. In fact, the very idea that the Zapruder film may have been altered never occurred to me.

I still think LBJ was behind it.

OKAY... Who Are You and What Have You Done With the Chronicle's Editorial Dept?

Even the SF Chronicle - the most pro-illegal alien paper in the nation - has to face the truth sometime. And while it's not in any way a repudiation of support for a blatantly unfair, racist, and profoundly damaging policy, it may be an indication that the pendulum may have reached it's zenith.

Seriously... when even the Chronicle - a paper who, at best, is heavily slanted towards amnesty and, at worst, is nothing more than a propaganda arm for open-borders advocates - comes out with an editorial like this, it is cause for at least a little hope.


Sanctuary Has Its Limits


San Francisco is re-examining a fervently held political doctrine. The well-intentioned notion of offering sanctuary for undocumented immigrants has its limits, the city has learned the hard way.

Over the past two decades, the city moved from offering sanctuary for political refugees fleeing wars or repressive governments in Central America to a wider acceptance of all illegal immigrants, whose lives and families would be disrupted if forced to leave.

But two recent scandals have spotlighted excesses that badly needed correcting. It remains to be seen whether city leaders will follow through.

In the first case, Mayor Gavin Newsom was forced to cancel a quiet policy of escorting juvenile lawbreakers out of the country. In some cases, the youths re-entered the country illegally and were arrested again. The program operated at odds with the conventional - and commonsense - practice of referring young drug dealers who are here illegally to federal immigration officials for deportation.

Then, this past week, a praiseworthy job-training program run by District Attorney Kamala Harris was found to contain a serious flaw. At least a half dozen offenders were being schooled for jobs even though none were here legally - and thus were ineligible for the jobs for which they were being trained. Harris has reworked the Back on Track program to bar undocumented immigrants.

Plainly these two city leaders recognize that a ever-widening accommodation of undocumented immigrants has gone too far, though neither took action until negative publicity forced them to make their moves.

The sanctuary policy is not just a matter of humanity - there is a practical crime-solving value for local law enforcement to hold the trust of immigrant communities.

But that potential law-enforcement benefit is lost when a sanctuary city becomes a refuge for criminals. San Francisco's welcome mat must be withdrawn for undocumented immigrants who commit felonies.

Contained in the letters section was D.A. Kamala Harris' half-assed response to the initial story, which was mainly to defend her pet program and only to pay lip service to the immigration and violence issues involved...

District Attorney Harris defends Back on Track

The Chronicle's article about San Francisco's Back on Track initiative painted a distorted picture of this nationally recognized program that has reduced crime and saves money.

Back on Track is an innovative initiative that has achieved remarkable results. It has dramatically reduced recidivism - the re-offense rate - among its targeted population (nonviolent, first-time, low-level drug offenders). In California, more than half (54 percent) of drug offenders commit additional crimes. However, fewer than 10 percent of Back on Track graduates in San Francisco re-offend (of the only 53% who actually graduate). That's why Back on Track was adopted as a national model by the National District Attorneys Association.

In addition to cutting crime, Back on Track is saving taxpayers money. Back on Track costs $5,000 per participant, while taxpayers pay 10 times as much - about $50,000 - to house each inmate in county jail or the state prison. On top of that, taxpayers save even more money because the initiative reduces recidivism - keeping just 25 people from returning to jail for one year saves taxpayers $1.25 million. In a time of catastrophic budget shortages, we desperately need initiatives like this that improve public safety while saving money.

Only nonviolent offenders are eligible for Back on Track. As a veteran prosecutor, I do not hesitate to put people who commit serious and violent offenses behind bars (if only for a few hours).

Eligibility for Back on Track is restricted to individuals who are first-time, nonviolent, low-level offenders with no gang affiliations, no prior convictions and no "ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) holds" that suggest possible immigration issues. No one with an ICE hold has ever been allowed to enter the Back on Track program. Additionally, every participant must prove they are legally eligible to work before they are admitted to the program.

In the program, participants are under close court supervision while undergoing a mandatory, intensive personal responsibility program. They must go back to school, get a job, get current with child support and attend parenting classes. Back on Track combines close supervision and strict accountability - and has proved to save money and reduce crime. Everyday people who are fed up with the petty drug dealers repeatedly coming back to their neighborhoods need solutions that work.

The flaw in the initiative that The Chronicle pointed out was fixed when it came to my attention. No innovative initiative will ever be created without some unanticipated flaws to be fixed along the way, but this must not stop us from tackling tough problems with smart solutions.

KAMALA D. HARRIS

District Attorney

San Francisco

Harris is clearly more concerned about her pet program than any of the people hurt by it. Harris goes on and on about the offenders, with not even one passing mention of the crimes they have committed and the people they have hurt.

And that right there is the crux of the matter: that is the very singular reason why Kamala Harris is a disgrace to her profession, a compete phony and a fraud, and someone who should be kept as far away from the State Attorney General's Office as possible.

You see... Kamala Harris loves criminals.

To someone like her, a criminal is just a person who has been dealt a raw hand, had some troubles, and became desperate. It is only because of bad circumstances that people commit crimes, and that even the most cold-blooded killer is just a human being worthy of our compassion.

And I'm sorry, but that is just plain wrong. It is ethically, morally, intellectually, and spiritually wrong.

Call me old-fashioned... but I believe that a law enforcement officer (and a just society) should have a healthy antipathy towards those who victimize others. To claim otherwise is not "justice." It is putting the criminal and the victim on the same moral footing. And that is seriously fucked up.

Chron's Jaxon Van Derbeken Accepts Eugene Katz Award

Now this one's kinda long, and kind of painful at times (Debra Saunders will not be winning any public speaking awards soon...) but worth the effort.

Jaxon Van Derbeken has been a shining diamond in the steaming turd known as the San Francisco Chronicle's reporting on immigration.

Chances are that, if it weren't for Jaxon, San Franciscans would be reading the sordid details of the City's illegal immigrant criminal shield in the LA Times or somewhere else from outside the Bay Area.

The Eugene Katz award is given out by the Center for Immigration Studies.

Jaxon's acceptance of the award (and the undisclosed amount of cash that went along with it) caused a lot of whining and gnashing-of-teeth by the local "Death to America!" Communists - who were outraged that a reporter in a paper from New Sodom would accept an award from (GASP!) a "right-wing group!"

Oh the humanity!!!

(As mentioned in the previous post, "right-winger" is roughly equivalent to "child molester" in San Fran, though not quite - child molesters are held in much higher regard than right wingers.)

Is the CIS a right wing group? Well... if you consider maintaining America's sovereignty as "right wing," if you consider enforcement of immigration laws as "right wing," if you think that being concerned over the massive amounts of immigration to the US - legal and illegal - is "right wing," if you believe that displaying concern that these massive immigration increases consist almost entirely of poor, third worlders with little education is "right wing," and, finally, if you believe that having grave suspicions about the motives of the politicians, activists, and businesses that are seemingly hell bent on systematically altering the genetic make-up of the country through massive third world immigration is "right wing," then.... yeah, they're a right wing group.

And besides, the Southern Poverty Pimp Center says so!

Keeping The Heat On Kamala

As of today, three of SFGate's Top 10 most commented stories have to do with the Kamala Harris/illegal alien criminal shield/Ramos murders story.

We will start with SFGate's Jaxon Van Derbeken's re-hash of the story broken by the LA Times covered (thoroughly) in the last post:


San Francisco District Attorney Kamala Harris' office on Monday defended allowing about a half dozen first-time drug offenders to clear their records by going through a job-training program, even after prosecutors learned they were deportable as undocumented immigrants.

But Harris' aides said they have since made changes in the program that would prevent a recurrence of instances in which illegal immigrants got their criminal records cleared by going through the Back on Track jobs program, which trains offenders for jobs that undocumented immigrants legally would be prevented from holding (Yeah... right. Sure they have. I'll believe that when an independent non-San Francisco government entity verifies that).

The Los Angeles Times first reported (ouch!) Monday that illegal immigrants had been enrolled in the program and that Harris' office had let several graduate and go free even after learning of their status.

The fallout Monday highlighted the pitfalls that could lie ahead for San Francisco politicians seeking higher office from a statewide electorate more conservative than the city's.

Last year, Mayor Gavin Newsom, who is now a candidate for governor, ordered juvenile justice officials to stop shielding illegal immigrant youths who commit crimes from possible deportation. On Monday, it was Harris, a candidate for attorney general, who came under scrutiny on the illegal immigration issue.

Not S.F.'s job

Harris was quoted in the Times as saying that enforcing federal immigration law was not the job of local authorities (though apparently breaking federal immigration law is). The district attorney was explaining how her office handled the case of Alexander Izaguirre, an illegal immigrant from Honduras who had been enrolled in the Back on Track program in July when he allegedly robbed a woman of her purse in Pacific Heights, then got into an SUV that drove into the victim (nearly killing her).

The woman, Amanda Kiefer, 30, suffered a fractured skull. She said in an interview Monday that she had gotten a good look at Izaguirre and the SUV driver.

"They were both laughing," Kiefer said.

Izaguirre, then 20, was one of at least seven undocumented immigrants (ILLEGAL ALIENS DAMMIT!) who participated the Back on Track program, which Harris created in 2005 as a way of reducing the number of drug offenders sent to overcrowded county jails and state prisons. In all, 113 people have successfully completed the program, with 99 failures, according to prosecutors' statistics.

Sold drugs in Tenderloin

Izaguirre was enrolled in the program after admitting to dealing drugs to an undercover officer in the Tenderloin in late 2007. He had two previous arrests, one for drugs and the other for purse snatching, records show. The charges were dropped.

The district attorney told the Times that she had not known Izaguirre was an illegal immigrant until after he was arrested for the alleged assault. Harris did not return repeated phone calls for comment Monday, and representatives of her office said she was not available.

Sheriff's deputies, who run the city's jails, screened Izaguirre after his drug arrest Dec. 7, 2007, and determined that he could fit the profile for reporting to the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, sheriff's spokeswoman Eileen Hirst said.

But Hirst said there is no record of whether deputies had actually referred Izaguirre to immigration officials, who could then have asked the city to put a hold on his release. She added that the department did not keep records of referrals at the time, but now does. ("Blame the Sheriff" is a familiar refrain here. We hear it again and again. And again... I will believe the City when an independent auditor proves that the City is not shielding illegal alien criminals - they cannot be taken at their word. Either the Sheriff's department is really incompetent, or their in on the whole deal.)

Feds have a hold now

Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, said the agency placed a hold on Izaguirre in August, after he was arrested in the alleged robbery. He is still in custody awaiting trial on robbery and assault charges.

Assistant District Attorney Sharon Woo, who oversees the Back on Track program, said Monday that prosecutors had assumed that offenders who sought to enroll were here legally because they had been screened by the Sheriff's Department.

After Izaguirre was arrested in the alleged assault, however, Harris' office checked and learned that six other offenders enrolled in Back on Track were not qualified to work in the United States, presumably because they were illegal immigrants.

Woo said all had been in the yearlong program for at least eight months and had been meeting all of the requirements, so Harris' office allowed them to finish the program early and have their criminal records expunged.

'Design flaw'

"Those individuals were in the program for a long period," Woo said. "When we realized there was a design flaw and they were without the ability to show they could work here legally," she said, her office "sat down and asked, 'What are we supposed to do here?'" (This alleged "design flaw" copout is bull... this agency, this government, is ALL ABOUT protecing and shielding illegal aliens. The only "flaw" was that it got exposed.)

Prosecutors concluded that they had struck what was in essence a contract with the offenders, who had fulfilled everything that was required of them.

Woo said that the "flaw" in the program had been fixed after Izaguirre's arrest and that the program now asks all those who apply whether they can legally work here ("Are you here illegaly? No? Then you're in!" What bullshit!).

Kiefer, reached in Michigan, where she moved after the attack, called the idea of clearing illegal immigrants' criminal records "crazy" (not to mention "fucked up, treasonous, insane...").

"We should be spending our tax dollars on our own citizens, not on people who are allowed to stay here after committing crimes," she said.

"I understand the whole sanctuary city thing - if people aren't causing any problems, why waste time and resources going after them?" Kiefer said. "But if they are committing crimes, they should not be here."

Here's a few choice comments from among the 993 (and counting) left by SFGate readers:

jorgeone: "Harris should be fired." (Thumbs up: 2061, Thumbs Down 80)

janicefreeman27: "Kamala Harris is the flaw in the design along with SF mayor Gavin Newsom. They have both greatly helped san francisco turn into a cesspool of what was once a great city." (Thumbs up: 1900, Thumbs down: 93)

nr5667: "She still planning on running for state AG? S.F must be an insular little republic if its politicians think they have a change outside the tip of the peninsula..."

nezumi: "I'm proud to state that I'm native San Franciscan whose family has been here since shortly after the Gold Rush and that there is not a life form at City Hall that I voted for. The Mayor and DA should be indicted on Federal Criminal Charges too numerous to expand on here; shall we start with aiding and abetting, harboring criminals, fraud, etc. No Sacramento for you KH, hope you are still on Willie's list or you will need Care Not Cash to remain in The City."

NOMAMA: "DEMAND AN FBI INVESTIGATION INTO HER, HER OFFICE & HER FINANCES."

chroncensored: "Wait till Edwin Ramos doesn't get charged with the Death Penalty. He will probably be charges with accidental firearms discharge and allowed to sue the Bolona's for unlawfully portraying gangsters. Then he'll sue and win 20 million dollars and start a scholarship under Kamala Walla Ding Dongs name. Something about "culturally affirming activities" Ar least GAVIN is breathing easier, his name ain't come up yet! Remember, the liberal stooges elected her TWICE, ONCE UNOPPOSED!"

etf: "How many times do these illegals have to do harm to citizens of this country before they are punished? How many more citizens have to be robbed or murdered? Elected officials like Harris have made the constitution of this country one big joke. It only protects illegals! What a sad state of affairs. Is there any wonder at all as to why this state is turning into a third world environment? Just look around. I've live in SF since 1973 and no longer recognize it. It's becoming more of a border town due to the so called progressive agendas. Newsom, Fong and Harris. What a huge void of leadership. SF is the Titanic and no one at city hall is going to take the helm and steer the ship away from the icebergs. SF leaders keep telling us that it's not an iceberg, but only ice cubes."

BerkeleyBW: "Public safety is obviously the last thing on the minds of people in the DA's office. It never occurs to them that their stupid policy decisions make the city more dangerous. As Adam Smith observed, "Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent."

tax_revolt: "edlim said Ah hahaha California is doomed to become a 3rd World State of Mexico.

????????????
.
What are you talking about? Compared to Mexico we've already dropped to fourth world status, no respectable third world nation would pay as much as California for the pleasure of being invaded and rearranged, since that makes them smarter the only place left is fourth.

idiotnoir: "what a country! not only do we let illegal aliens into our country to steal jobs from americans and drive down wages, we will train them so they can steal even better jobs from americans!"

end_timer2: "This goes far beyond simply voting her out of office. This idiot woman DA is responsible for countless deaths that are the direct result of her NOT DOING HER JOB!! Refusing to prosecute violent gang criminals, enabling illegal immigrants to avoid arrest and deportation and coming up with insane arguments for why her office cannot and will not prosecute criminal defendants. There needs to be an investigation by the Feds and the FBI of Harris and the DA's office, as I suspect corruption on her part, probably involving large sums of money in offshore bank accounts, coming from drug gangs in return for her making sure there are no prosecutions of certain gang members/illegal immigrant gang members. There can be no other reason for her actions, except total incompetence on her part. And if that is the case, then she needs to be removed as DA, and replaced with someone who knows how to prosecute criminals so they get put away for their crimes."

And so on and so on and so on.

But... you should know that not everyone is miffed at Harris and her sorry D.A.'s office (just 99% of them)...

In fact, there are some who are actually standing up and backing the D.A. with Don Quixote-like zeal...

BeyondChron - an ultra-left website run by the Tenderloin Housing Clinic and funded from the taxpayer trough - ran a piece called "Chronicles Unfair Hit On Kamala" that mostly bitched about the link that ran with the piece to her opponents' press release calling for Harris to release recidivism statistics for her "success stories" (the link has since been removed from SFGate, but can be seen here).

You see... Harman is a (gasp) "right-winger!"

Calling someone a "right-winger" in San Fran is like calling someone a "child molester" anywhere else (child molesters are held in much higher regard in S.F. than right-wingers).

Beyond Chron implies that the "attack" may have been due to sour grapes over being scooped by the LA Times, and nowhere does BC take the story on its merits - in short, it was a very fair "hit" on a crooked politician.

Another Nail In Kamala's Koffin?

San Fran's criminal-coddling excuse for a District Attorney Kamala Harris has received yet another blow to her hopes to become California's chief criminal-coddler; the Los Angeles Times (of all people) has reported that yet another illegal alien criminal went on to commit vicious crimes against American citizens after being shielded from deportation by the City government.

The assault on Amanda Kiefer at dusk in San Francisco's posh Pacific Heights was extraordinary enough for its cruelty.

A stranger, later identified as Alexander Izaguirre, snatched her purse and hopped into an SUV, police say. The driver sped forward to run Kiefer down. Terrified, she leaped onto the hood and saw Izaguirre and the driver laughing. The driver slammed on the brakes, propelling Kiefer to the pavement. Her skull fractured. Blood oozed from her ear.

Only after the July 2008 attack did Kiefer learn of the crime's political ramifications. Izaguirre, police told her, was an illegal immigrant who had pleaded guilty four months earlier to a drug felony for selling cocaine in the seedy Tenderloin area.

He had avoided prison when he was picked for a jobs program run by San Francisco Dist. Atty. Kamala Harris, now a candidate for California's top law enforcement post. In effect, Harris' office had been allowing Izaguirre and other illegal immigrants to stay out of prison by training them for jobs they cannot legally hold.

The program, Back on Track, is a centerpiece of Harris' campaign for state attorney general. Until questioned by The Times about the Izaguirre case, Harris, a Democrat, had never publicly acknowledged that the program included illegal immigrants. In interviews last week, she and her office offered inconsistent explanations.

Izaguirre's trial this fall for the Kiefer attack -- his arrest forced him out of the program and into jail -- will put Harris in the middle of the controversy over San Francisco's lax policies toward illegal immigrants.

The city has a history of shielding some illegal immigrant criminals from deportation. The assault on Kiefer occurred just a month after a triple homicide in San Francisco that put Mayor Gavin Newsom on the spot over the city's repeated release of Edwin Ramos, the illegal immigrant accused of the slayings.

Izaguirre's assault arrest, by contrast, drew almost no public attention.

Kiefer, then 29, was walking with a friend to a restaurant when the attack occurred. To her (and, indeed to anyone else with a brain), it makes no sense that the D.A.'s office would set Izaguirre free after his earlier drug arrest -- or enroll him and other illegal immigrant felons in Back on Track.

(But, sadly, this makes perfect sense to San Francisco's pussified leftists. Illegal Immigrants - particularly Hispanic illegal immigrants - are, for all practical intents and purposes, a protected class in San Francisco.

"If they've committed crimes and they're not citizens, then why are they here?" Kiefer asked. "Why haven't they been deported?"

(And, perhaps more to the point, why has the U.S. Attorney's Office done NOTHING while American citizens are being victimized? I do not expect the race-baiting, criminal-coddling City of San Francisco to stand up for the rights of its citizens, but I would like to think that the U.S. Attorney's Office would at least take an interest.)

Harris said she first learned that illegal immigrants were training for jobs in Back on Track when Izaguirre, then 20, was arrested for the Kiefer assault and other crimes on a purse-snatching spree.

Izaguirre had been selected for the program after two arrests within eight months; an alleged purse-snatching preceded his arrest for selling cocaine. Because completion leads to the expunging of a felony conviction, the program has a waiting list of potential entrants. Selections are made solely by the district attorney's office.

It was a mistake, Harris said, to let illegal immigrants into the program, a "flaw in the design."

"I believe we fixed it," Harris said in an interview at her office in San Francisco. "So moving forward, it is about making sure that no one enters Back on Track if they cannot hold legal employment."

Exactly how many illegal immigrants have been included since the program began four years ago is not publicly known.

Harris said that after Izaguirre's arrest she never asked -- and has never learned -- how many illegal immigrants were in the program. Sharon Woo and Sharon Owsley, the prosecutors who oversee the program, said they too never asked and have never learned the number.

But after the interviews, Harris spokeswoman Erica Derryck said the D.A.'s office had in fact "assessed who would not have been able to meet" the new requirement for legal papers to obtain a job.

"We deliberated on how best to handle this group, given that they entered the program under different criteria," Derryck said -- in other words, as illegal immigrants.

The San Francisco chapter of Goodwill Industries International handles day-to-day oversight of Back on Track participants for the D.A.'s office. Carlos Serrano-Quan, a Goodwill supervisor, said it appeared that fewer than a dozen illegal immigrants had been in the program.

Whatever the number, Harris said that once she realized that illegal immigrants were enrolled, she (STILL!) allowed those who were following the rules to finish the program and have their criminal records cleared. It is not the duty of local law enforcement, she said, to enforce federal immigration laws (but apparently in San Francisco, it is the duty of law enforcement to WILLFULLY VIOLATE FEDERAL IMMIGRATION LAW AT EVERY TURN! Again... where is the mother-fucking U.S. Attorney's Office?).

"My issue was more, what are we going to do to prevent this from happening in the future?" she said.

Some of the illegal immigrants were allowed to graduate before finishing an entire 12 months of the program, as normally required, according to the D.A.'s spokeswoman.

"The whole point of the program," Harris said, "is that these people would be able to obtain and hold down lawful employment, and if they're undocumented, they probably would not be able to do that, so it would go against the very spirit of the program" to continue admitting them.

Harris, 44, was elected district attorney in 2003 and reelected in 2007. She designed Back on Track to help young adults who are arrested once for selling drugs; the goal is to help them avoid falling into a life of crime. Like cities and counties across the nation, San Francisco was already running several programs with that goal.

Back on Track participants agree to plead guilty to a drug felony and spend a year in the program, a mix of community service, employment and life-skills training, family counseling and English lessons for those who need them. While in the program, they are free to live where they wish.

Even natural adversaries of the district attorney have applauded Back on Track.

"It's very innovative for the district attorney to have a program like this," said Simin Shamji, a deputy public defender in San Francisco. It might work better, she said, if the D.A.'s office ceded some control and collaborated more with social service agencies.

Over the last four years, 113 admitted drug dealers have graduated from the program, while 99 were yanked for failing to meet the requirements and sentenced under their guilty plea, according to the D.A.'s office.

(OKAY OKAY OKAY! TIME OUT! Let's take a look at those last three paragraphs again. This fucking stupid program is being touted as a "success" and "innovative" and then in the very next fucking line, it is admitted that it has an 47% FAILURE RATE! FUCKING HELL!

If this... THIS... is the future of law enforcement than we might as well all slit our wrists now. This is the future of FAILURE!

Oh, and by the way, the public defender's and D.A.'s offices may be natural adversaries in a normal world, but here in batshit San Francisco, they often work towards the same goals, which usually involve less or no punishment for criminals.)

Harris said graduates of the program are far less likely than other offenders to commit crimes again, but her spokeswoman declined to provide detailed statistics (because she's a fucking liar).

In her campaign for attorney general, Harris calls Back on Track a model for a statewide approach to preventing crime and easing prison overcrowding (again, because she's a fucking liar).

The campaign has consumed much of Harris' time in recent months. Last week, she was raising money at homes in Calabasas, Studio City, Pacific Palisades and Hollywood.

Harris' liberal San Francisco pedigree will pose challenges in a statewide race, particularly her 2004 vow to "never charge the death penalty." That pledge will be put to the test in the upcoming murder trial of Ramos, the illegal immigrant accused in the shooting deaths of a man and his two sons. Harris has not announced whether she will seek the death penalty (She won't... though if she did it would just go to show what a calculating, conniving backstabber she is.)

Now, the Izaguirre case adds a new complication to her campaign.

"The immigration issue, as it relates to the Izaguirre case, obviously is a huge kind of pimple on the face of this program," Harris acknowledged. An instant later, she regretted the metaphor, saying, "I don't mean to trivialize it, nor do I mean to cover it up." (Obviously to this fucking bitch, the assaults, rapes, and murders of American citizens are a small price to pay for the maintenance of this failed criminal-coddling program.)

Handcuffed and wearing an orange jail uniform, Izaguirre appeared Wednesday in a San Francisco courtroom. He told a judge he would plead guilty to robbery for the July 2008 purse-snatchings. But for reasons that were left unclear, he then abruptly withdrew the plea and backed out of a deal with prosecutors that would have put him in prison for three years and four months. His trial is set to begin Sept. 4 and he could be deported afterward.

"He is being prosecuted, and he will be deported with my full encouragement and support," Harris said (now that there's nowhere to hide).

Kiefer, who packages medical devices for a living, said she has left California for good, in part because of the trauma of nearly having been killed on her way to dinner last summer in Pacific Heights. Nearly a year later, she remains baffled that San Francisco authorities ever let Izaguirre and other illegal immigrant felons back onto the streets.

"If they're committing crimes," she said, "I think there's something wrong that they're not being deported."


Oh, there's something wrong all right... and it's not just with a few nutjobs like Harris... what is wrong is the entire City's attitude towards crime and illegal aliens specifically. There's also something deeply deeply wrong with a City that celebrates an American citizen fleeing for her life and an illegal alien criminal happily roaming the streets looking for more victims.

One of the main reasons I started this blog was to expose Kamala Harris for the heartless bitch that she is. San Fran's D.A.'s office is the laughing stock of the nation, and any comment from this office saying that they stand for law and order is an out-and-out lie; this D.A.'s office's primary concern is helping criminals - particularly non-white criminals - escape punishment.

We can only pray to whatever higher power we believe in that this criminal loving activist lawyer's chances at becoming Attorney General are thwarted. San Francisco is - and should be - the only place on God's green earth that a person like Harris could ever fool the people into thinking she's some kind of "crime fighter" - rather than an apologist and enabler for minority criminals.

And here's one final thought... this blog has taken on as its mission the exposure of this fraud, and I will do everything in my power to make sure that Kamala Harris NEVER becomes Attorney General of California. You can count on there being lots and lots of revelations as the election comes closer, and I will print every damn one of them.

The fact that Kamala Harris is seriously considered a candidate for Attorney General in California is proof of how far this state has slid down its moral sinkhole, proof that a large portion - if not a majority - of San Franciscans are insane by any measure of the word, and that the City itself is severely mentally ill.


Note: This version corrects a previous version in which I did some shoddy math and made the claim that Back on Track's failure rate was 88%. It is actually 47% according to the D.A.'s office figures. Also note that these "success stories" only graduated the program; no indication (and I doubt any will be forthcoming) as to how many of them re-offended.

When is a Hate Crime Not a Hate Crime? (Like I have To Ask...)

Cal State’s Brian Levin And The Case Of The Hate Crime That Wasn’t. (Guess Why Not), by Peter Bradley

Last week's shooting at the Holocaust Museum has made “hate crimes” a front page issue once again. It may give the stalled federal hate crimes bill the added boost it needs to become law. In James von Brunn, the media seems to have discovered its carefully created stereotype of a hate criminal: an old, bitter white man with a history of violence, who denies the Holocaust, despises non-whites and holds bizarre conspiracy theories.

The usual suspects have hustled to take advantage of their good fortune. Brian Levin (email him), a Cal State San Bernardino criminal justice professor and a "civil-rights attorney" who used to work with the Southern Poverty Law Center ($PLC), declared in a CNN.com article, Hate groups threatened by diversity:

"Yesterday, less than a mile from the White House, an old bigoted white man was suspected of firing back his response at the place where America tries to draw lessons from ... hatred. Yesterday's shooting is the latest in a series of murderous attacks by erratic far-right-wing extremist ‘lone wolves’ over the past three months. When shocking violence like this arises, commentators point to various factors including mental illness, political debates and the availability of guns.

“We, however, must first acknowledge the hand of a small but expanding hate movement as a potent, yet invisible, accomplice that incites and inspires society's disaffected to serve as its most violent warriors."

Levin mentions the pending hate crimes bill as "good news" near the end of his column.

Leftist blogs such as TPMCafe are exploiting the incident to push for censorship and/or punishment of views they don't like:

"Hate speech and hate crimes are sociological, not just psychological. It's ridiculous to look at one of these crimes from the shortened perspective of the point of the gun to the victim. It's much bigger than that. That's why I think it's a misconception to conclude any racist who takes someone's life 'acted alone' or is 'a lone wolf'

“Instigation is critical here. We need to make a serious assessment of those who disguise their hate speech as free speech." [When it comes to hate crimes, there's no such thing as "acting alone". June 10, 2009, 8:47PM]

But two weeks before the von Brunn shootings, The San Jose Mercury News ran a short article about a similar crime that was just as deadly as the Holocaust Museum incident.

The killers were motivated by the same type of hatred and extremism.

Yet, for some strange reason, the murder has attracted almost no attention or outrage.

In July 2007, Michael Wills, a white man, was shot and killed by two members of Your Black Muslim Bakery. As the name suggests, the bakery was a racial-nationalist outfit with ties to the Nation of Islam (the store even displayed a prominent picture of NOI founder Elijah Muhammed). Yusuf Bey IV, the leader of the now-defunct bakery, and Antoine Mackey, one of Bey's followers, were charged with shooting Wills in the head with an assault rifle.

The Mercury News article leaves no doubt as to the racial motive of the murder:

"Devaughndre Broussard, another Bey IV follower who has admitted to killing journalist Chauncey Bailey, told a prosecutor in March that Bey IV and Mackey bragged they killed Wills because of his race. The two saw him walking in North Oakland as they were discussing a string of racially motivated murders in the 1970s known as the Zebra killings.

“'They was laughing about and joking about,' Broussard said of Bey IV and Mackey.

“Mackey 'said he seen the white dude walking down the path ... then he shot him,' Broussard added.

“Bey IV later said, ‘We got a devil. White people are devils,’ according to Broussard's statement.

“Then Broussard said Bey IV talked about ‘a devil mentality. A black man can be a devil if he's against his people.’ Bey IV and his late father, bakery founder Yusuf Bey, have often, while preaching, referred to white people as ‘devils.’ And in telephone calls recorded from the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin and obtained by the Chauncey Bailey Project, Bey IV often made similar statements, referring to ‘white and Jew devils’ and ‘media devils’ whom he claims are trying to destroy him."

[Former bakery leader accused of saying 'white people are devils' after 2007 killing, By Josh Richman and Thomas, May 26, 2009]

An open and shut case of a racially-motivated hate crime? Think again. Prosecutors are not seeking a hate crime charge against Bey IV and Mackey.

And that decision meets with the approval of those who direct race policy in America. The Mercury News article continues:

"Prosecutors tend to be very hesitant to charge hate crime cases "... because they're really, really hard to prove: You have to prove the offender's motive beyond a reasonable doubt," explained Associate Professor Phyllis Gerstenfeld, [Email her] a ‘hate-crime expert’ who chairs the criminal justice program at Cal State, Stanislaus. ‘Hate crimes are the only criminal acts that require you to prove motive beyond a reasonable doubt... and we can't read people's minds.’"

We can’t? Prosecutors had no problems reading the minds of the James Byrd and Matthew Shepherd killers. Nor are they likely to have much problem peering into von Brunn's thought process.

According to the Mercury News, a certain "civil rights attorney" agrees that hate crime charges do not make sense in this particular case.

He said:

"Why go through having to interject something that now has to be proven to a particular standard? It can be highly appropriate for (prosecutors) tactically to avoid overburdening the jury with additional items. Sometimes the cleanest, simplest case is the best."

The person making these remarks: none other than Cal State San Bernadino’s Brian Levin—who had no problem lecturing us about the threat posed by "an old bigoted white man" only weeks later.

Unlike "civil rights" attorneys, the distraught Wills family wants to pursue a hate crime charge. According to Patrick Wills, younger brother of the victim:

"Everybody knows the only reason (Michael Wills) was shot was because he was white. So I don't see any reason why that (hate crime enhancement) should not be part of the charges. For it to not to be there is horrible."

Horrible or not, the decision not to pursue hate crime charges against the killers of Wills is not surprising given the race of the victim and the shooters.

But Your Black Muslim Bakery has a long history of racial violence that leaves von Brunn in the shade. Though held up as a model of black self sufficiency, the bakery was linked to widespread physical and sexual abuse, intimidation, welfare fraud, and murder. Bey IV and Mackey also had good reason to joke about the Zebra Killings as some of the killers—all black Muslims—were connected to the bakery according to Clark Howard, author of Zebra, the definitive book on the murders.[Read the first chapter (PDF)]

The Zebra Killings occurred in the San Francisco bay area between 1972 and 1974. Though seldom discussed, they are the worst case of racially-motivated serial murder in U.S. history. Carried out by black Muslims who went looking to kill "white devils", the attacks left up to 71 people dead and many injured.

Bey IV and Mackey were apparently looking to add to this legacy.

The late Sam Francis used to note that some hate crimes are more equal than others. The different reactions to the von Brunn and Your Black Muslim Bakery shootings prove that nothing has changed.

When the hate crimes bill is debated in the Senate you can be sure the names Matthew Shepard, James Byrd, James von Brunn and Stephen Johns, the black guard killed in the Holocaust Museum shooting, will be highlighted.

You can also be sure that the names Michael Wills, Yusuf Bey IV and Antoine Mackey will never be mentioned.

The hate crimes bill, if passed, will certainly stifle free speech and strengthen the thought police. It will also be yet another exercise in unequal and selective justice.

Not Exactly The Anti-Fong... But We Could Do Worse...

Meet George Gascon - the outgoing chief from Mesa, AZ - who has been picked as the new Police Chief to replace Heather "the feather" Fong. He will take control by August.

No doubt he will face some serious hurdles... though what exactly those hurdles are is open to interpretation.

According to the left-leaning SF Chronicle...

He faces a department beset with challenges: complaints of low officer morale, poor case resolution rates, allegations of racial profiling and a faulty discipline system that can keep good officers off the streets and bad officers on the payroll for years.

Though some have a different view...

"I think he's got a chance for success, but it's a steep mountain," said Gary Delagnes, president of the San Francisco Police Officers Association, who hoped one of the department's own would get the job. "I think if anybody has a chance of success coming in from the outside, it's going to be him. But it's not going to be easy."

Delagnes summed up the main difficulty in one word: politics.

San Francisco is unique, Delagnes said, and a successful chief must understand the players in the mayor's office, the Board of Supervisors, the command staff, the media and the Police Commission, the civilian oversight body that handles discipline and sets departmental policy.

"It's like no other place in America," Delagnes said. "He's got to see where the knives are coming from, and the knives are coming from day one. They (have) already started ... The poor guy couldn't get through one press conference without being taken on about towed vehicles."

Clearly one of the early "knife-holders" will be newly elected Supe John Avalos - who has already proven to be a complete fuckhead - and has shown that he will be one serious pain in the ass to anyone who doesn't tow the PC, anti-cop, anti-white, pro-Communist line.

Supervisor David Campos, a former police commissioner who came to the United States illegally as a child, said he is drafting legislation aimed at reversing the mayor's year-old policy of handing over undocumented juvenile immigrants to federal authorities if arrested on suspicion of a felony.

Gascón said he backs a sanctuary city policy that allows undocumented immigrants to approach local authorities without fear of arrest if they've done nothing but cross the border illegally. But he made clear he agrees that it's appropriate to turn over immigrants arrested for other crimes, if the arrest was conducted properly, including finding there was probable cause a crime was committed.

Despite the lies spouted forth by the SF Chronicle's arsenal of pro-amnesty columnists, the support for Sanctuary City policy is waning, particularly after the Chron's own articles outing the city's kid gloves handling of illegal alien juvenile felons - and the outrage following the Bologna Family murders by an illegal alien MS-13 gangster. The Chron falls all over itself publicizing the very loud efforts of local racist reconquista groups, but would never have the balls to find out what San Franciscans really think about the policy and how it has been gamed and corrupted.

A more honest view of the hurdles Gascon faces is found in this op-ed by retired San Francisco Deputy Police Chief Kevin Mullen. He makes some very important and very obvious points which I will highlight thusly...

The goals Mayor Gavin Newsom has set for George Gascón, his new police chief, are to "Implement a computerized system for spotting crime trends, increase the crime clearance rate and improve the morale of rank-and-file officers." Those goals should be simple to meet because the mechanisms to achieve them have been around for a long time. All it will take is the political will.

As to morale, Gascón is coming to a police department crying for change - and a very different organization from that which Chief Charles Gain, the last chief named from outside the department, confronted in the 1970s. At that time, the police department and much of the citizenry presented a united front against the new chief. Today, the department and the city are composed of numerous identity groups, all vying for a piece of the pie.

There is one issue within the power of the chief to effect, however, upon which all but the most marginal participants can agree: Serious violent crime.

By taking a different posture from his predecessor, who has maintained a low profile in the city and the police department, Chief Gascón can step forward to mobilize the vast energies of officers who are looking to be led. To do this, he will have to avoid or neutralize the factional recriminations which accompany much of what passes for civic discourse in San Francisco these days.

A large part of what troubles police officers is the lenient treatment of many serious offenders by an overly tolerant district attorney and the courts.

AMEN BROTHER!

Despite his support for some sort of Sanctuary City law, I wish Chief Gascon the best of luck. He's going to need it. We live in one of the most anti-cop cities in the United States, with a Board of complete childish assholes looking to fuck up anything that might make this town more livable to anyone who is not a goddamn freak, and a Mayor who will push the knife in himself if he has to.


Still, he'll be a better chief than Fong. He could hardly be any worse.

The Battle of the Trough

San Francisco's City Hall was apparently a zoo today - even more so than usual - as two competing groups of parasites battled over who gets to bleed the city dry.

On one hand, you have the "public services" sector - a seemingly unending mob of bum enablers, illegal immigrant protectors, ethnic tribalists, halfway-house racketeers, "re-education" corps, "community outreach specialists" (whatever the fuck that is), and a whole host of others who sole mission in life is to not work. The City unions are no better, containing a few hard-working dedicated people picking up the slack of the majority of overpaid, overcompensated, lazy, complaining loafers.

On the other, the "public safety" sector - folks like the cops and fire department, who do a much needed service but at a vastly over-inflated price. The cushy retirement packages are legendary, as are the immense amounts of overtime.

Left out of this whole debate - as usual - are the taxpayers. One thing that is certain is that neither the Mayor's office or the Board of Supervisors would consider - even for a moment - cutting the City's bloated budget if they didn't absolutely have to.

The mob scene beautifully showed the main problem with San Francisco: Too many pigs at the trough; way too many people relying way too much on the government.

Of course, having a Board of Supervisors where 6 0f the 9 members are out-and-out Communists, and a Mayor who believes that no problem exists that can't be cured by more taxes, doesn't help in the slightest. (Mayor Newsom would be considered a tax-and-spend Socialist in any other city in America, but he just looks conservative-ish in comparison to the collectivist rabble on the Board).

It's a shame they can't both lose. But we can always hope!

Nat Hentoff on 'Hate Crime' Laws

Illegal Alien Killer-gate Update: Preliminary Hearings in Bologna Family Case Finally Begin

Michael & Tony Bologna

Edwin Ramos - the illegal alien who murdered 3 American citizens in broad daylight in S.F., and who, despite being a multiple felon, was repeatedly shielded from immigration authorities by S.F.'s sanctuary city policy - is finally going to court.

Matthew Bologna

A year after the fatal daylight shootings of a San Francisco father and his two sons inflamed controversy over the city's sanctuary policies for protecting illegal immigrants, the 22-year-old suspect appeared in court Monday for a preliminary hearing that will determine whether he stands trial.

Edwin Ramos, a Salvadoran immigrant and alleged member of the MS-13 gang, was once shielded from possible deportation under an interpretation of San Francisco's sanctuary policy that officials have since disowned.

Ramos is accused of murdering Tony Bologna, 48, and his sons Matthew, 20, and Michael, 16. Prosecutors say he mistook his younger victims for gang rivals when he opened fire on them June 22 as they drove in the Excelsior district near their home.

The killings, authorities said, happened when Tony Bologna blocked a car making a left turn while he was driving home from a family picnic. The killer opened fire after Bologna backed up to let the other car past.

Ramos has pleaded not guilty to murder counts that carry the special circumstances of multiple murder and murder as part of a street gang. The charges make him eligible for life imprisonment without parole or the death penalty if he is convicted, although District Attorney Kamala Harris has never sought execution since taking office in 2004.

The preliminary hearing is expected to last several days in San Francisco Superior Court, after which Judge Teri Jackson will decide whether Ramos must stand trial. It began Monday after Ramos sought unsuccessfully to have the judge close the hearing to the public. His attorneys argued that some evidence or testimony could endanger Ramos' wife and child if it is aired.

Ramos appeared in court with his ankles and left wrist shackled, and frequently whispered comments about testimony to his attorney. About a dozen members of the Bologna family - including Tony Bologna's widow, Danielle Bologna - attended the proceedings but declined to comment.

Little of Monday's testimony touched on the shooting itself. Prosecutor Harry Dorfman spent most of his time attempting to prove that Ramos was a gang member by linking him to gang-related incidents and to other alleged members.

One police officer testified that on the night Ramos was arrested, his 14-year-old sister-in-law said she thought he was a Sureño; the MS-13 gang, the officer said, is considered to be a subset of the Sureños.

Defense attorney Marla Zamora suggested the evidence of gang membership was flimsy, and under cross-examination another officer said Ramos had not been on a list of registered gang members in San Francisco.

During a break in testimony, Zamora said she planned a vigorous defense of Ramos, who she asserted was in the country legally.

"He did not shoot anybody on June 22, 2008, and he is not a gang member," Zamora said.

The Chronicle revealed last year that Ramos could have been deported after he was found to have committed two felonies at age 17, a gang-related assault of a young man aboard a Muni bus and the attempted robbery of a pregnant woman. But juvenile justice authorities did not surrender him to federal officials for possible deportation.

City Attorney Dennis Herrera subsequently said there was nothing in the city's policy of refusing to cooperate with federal authorities in deporting illegal immigrants that required juvenile justice officials to protect youths who commit felonies.

Mayor Gavin Newsom ordered juvenile authorities to turn over underage offenders to the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency if they were undocumented immigrants.

The Bologna family has sued the city, blaming the city's "official and unofficial" sanctuary policies for allowing Ramos to walk free before the killings.

... and here's hoping the family can take us for everything. It would serve this batshit leftist government right.