SF Police Commission Meeting: Recognition, Reports, Officer Election, Benchmarks, Closed Session – June 11, 2025
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San Francisco Police Commission Meeting – June 11, 2025
The San Francisco Police Commission met on Wednesday, June 11, 2025, with six commissioners present and a quorum. The agenda included a citizen recognition award, consent calendar, the Acting Chief's crime report, the DPA Director's report, commission reports, election of officers, a presentation on new disparity benchmarks, and a vote to enter closed session. Acting Chief Paul Yep and DPA Executive Director Paul Henderson presented reports.
Citizen Recognition Award
- The Commission honored Carissa Cleverly-Valencia, a registered nurse at UCSF, for her actions on January 27, 2025, when she stopped her car after hearing gunshots on 9th Street and applied direct pressure to a shooting victim's wounds with her sweater until medics arrived. Sergeant Coleman and Sergeant Wells of Tenderloin Station described the scene; the treating physician said her actions "absolutely" saved the victim's life. She received a certificate from Acting Chief Yep and a Tenderloin Station sweatshirt.
- Public comment: A mother of a homicide victim thanked her personally, saying she wished someone like her had been present when her son was murdered.
Consent Calendar
- The Commission unanimously (6-0) received and filed the SFPD and DPA SB 1421 and SB 16 monthly report for May 2025.
Public Comments & Testimony
- General public comment: Chris Ward Klein, an active-duty U.S. Marine Corps sergeant, said riots and violence were "here," asked SFPD to join a strike force to arrest six people, and made claims about signal intelligence and digital surveillance by SFPD.
- A mother of homicide victim Arboria Casa (later identified by commissioners as Paulette Brown) spoke about a Board of Supervisors resolution to establish reward/tip funding for unsolved homicides, and asked the Commission to support it.
- During public comment on the Chief's report, Karen Fleshman, a member of the Justice for Mario Woods coalition, named several individuals killed by SFPD—including Jessica Williams, Luis Gongora Pat, Mario Woods, Emil Carrez Lopez, and Alex Nieto—and urged that their stories remain central in the criteria for selecting the next chief.
- After the officer election, public commenters thanked outgoing President Elias and congratulated the new officers; one urged the chief search process to include direct outreach to communities most impacted by policing.
Discussion Items
- Chief's Report: Acting Chief Paul Yep reported crime trends for June 2–8, 2025. Year-to-date crime was down 27%, with homicides down 23%, burglaries down 23%, and motor vehicle theft down 43%. There were no homicides in the reporting week; one shooting injured two people on June 6. An aggravated assault/mayhem incident involved a severed ear and a second assault; a suspect was arrested. An officer was struck by a vehicle on June 3. A pedestrian was killed in a traffic collision on June 2. The Chief discussed the department's response to First Amendment protests: 20 reported uses of force over two days (baton strikes and physical force), approximately 155 arrests on June 8 and 92 on June 9, and drone deployment on both days. The Chief read the department's statement affirming support for peaceful First Amendment activity and the city's sanctuary policy prohibiting local law enforcement from assisting federal immigration enforcement. He said the department would respond to the June 11 letter from the First Amendment Coalition and the Society of Professional Journalists of Northern California.
- DPA Director's Report: Executive Director Paul Henderson reported that complaints year-to-date are significantly higher than last year; sustained cases are slightly lower; three cases are over the 270-day review threshold. DPA faces proposed cuts to four filled positions (three DPA, one Sheriff's Office) and will defend its budget at a hearing on June 13. An ongoing use-of-force audit includes surveys sent to SFPD supervisors, closing June 16.
- Commission Reports: Commissioners thanked protest participants, journalists, and police; reaffirmed sanctuary city policy; recognized gun violence awareness month and Juneteenth/Pride; congratulated Paulette Brown on the Board of Supervisors resolution. Commissioner Benedicto requested a comprehensive later-summer presentation reviewing SFPD's protest response, including uses of force, arrests, drone deployment, and the FAC/SPJ letter allegations.
- Election of Officers: Commissioner Clay was elected President and Commissioner Benedicto Vice President unanimously (6-0). President Clay dissolved the three-person search committee appointed May 21 by former President Elias, citing a Sunshine Ordinance violation, and said he would work with the Department of Human Resources, potentially engage a headhunter, ensure full commissioner participation, and provide regular public updates on the chief search.
- Disparity Benchmark Analysis: Staff presented a new stops dashboard and three additional benchmarks beyond the traditional census benchmark. The Risk-Adjusted Disparity Index compares stops to violent crime victimization risk; results over six quarters showed Black/white contacts near parity relative to victimization risk, while Hispanic individuals were stopped less than expected. The Suspect-Adjusted Disparity Index compares stops to reported violent-crime suspects; Black and Hispanic individuals were underrepresented relative to whites based on incidents. The Traffic Analytic Layout uses not-at-fault collision data as a proxy for the driving population. Discussion noted limitations from the DPA stop-data audit; the department stated the analysis was not affected by the audit issues and that the error rate has fallen below 5%. Public commenter Karen Fleshman questioned whether the new benchmarks legitimize racial profiling; the department responded that benchmarks are multiple measures and that population benchmarks alone are flawed.
Key Outcomes
- Citizen Recognition Award presented to Carissa Cleverly-Valencia.
- Consent calendar approved 6-0.
- Commissioner Clay elected Commission President and Commissioner Benedicto Vice President (6-0).
- The May 21 chief-search committee appointment was dissolved; a new search process and regular public updates were promised.
- The Commission voted unanimously (6-0) to enter closed session for Item 11. The available transcript ends as the Commission returned to open session for the required vote on disclosing closed-session discussion; no disclosure decision is recorded.
- Commissioner Benedicto's request to agendize a comprehensive review of SFPD's protest response later in the summer was made.
- The Chief agreed to provide a full response to the First Amendment Coalition/SPJ letter, with the response to be shared with the Commission and agendized.
Meeting Transcript
President Lyus like to take call roll. Commissioner Scott is in route. Commissioner Leon present. Commissioner Clay. Present. Commissioner Benedicto. Present. Commissioner Yi. Here. President Lyons, you have a quorum also with us tonight. Our Acting Chief Paul Yep and Executive Director Paul Henderson from the Department of Police Accountability. Great. Thank you. Hello, everyone. Welcome to our June 11th meeting. Sergeant, go ahead and call the first item. Line item one, citizen recognition award. Carissa Cleverly Valencia, registered nurse at UCSF. Good evening, everybody, Chief, Commissioners, Mr. Henderson. Uh thank you for having us back again from Tenderloin Station. Uh this is going to be a little bit of a collaborative effort. Um I'm just here to kind of lay a little foundation for what the rest of the crew are going to present to you. Um the reason I want to do that is this is kind of a little bit different from my perspective. So on January 27th, around almost 5 o'clock, there was a shooting over on 9th Street over here, the unit block of 9th. Um, as a result of that, the officers, Sergeant Coleman, his team, Lieutenant Rogers, they all went to that scene and handled that scene incredibly well. With a very depends on how you look at it, extremely professional response, extremely professional. Um I'm gonna say outcome uh regarding that. I won't go into details because it was an officer involved shooting. That being said, when I arrived at the scene, I'm gonna tell you first of all, I had absolutely nothing to do with their great work. All right. I arrived based on circumstances. But what makes this unusual is that upon me arriving and talking to the lieutenant that was there handling the scene incredibly well, Sergeant Coleman. The first thing they wanted to explain to me was you won't believe what Carissa did. And I'm gonna let them explain it to you because we respond to a lot of things that were kind of going into the routine. We know what to do, we know what to expect. We've responded to this before, but all of a sudden something different happens. And that became the focus at some point in time was Carissa's actions. And they went out of their way to just keep telling me about how her actions were so impressive that they stepped up and wanted to do something to recognize her. I will let Sergeant Coleman speak to those actions. Bear with me, I'm just getting my voice back. Uh good evening, members of the police commission, Chief Yep, members of the command staff, members of the SFPD, and members of the public. I'm Sergeant Coleman, Tenderloin Station. Tonight, the SFPD would like to recognize the courageous actions of Carissa Clever cleverly Valencia regarding a shooting incident which occurred in January of this year. On January 27th at 1654 hours, the suspect in this incident was armed with a handgun. He approached the victim who was in front of 799th Street. Without provoc provocation, the suspect pointed the firearm at the victim and shot him in the face. Suspect then shot him multiple shot at him multiple times. The victim fell to the ground and the suspect continued to shoot at him. The victim sustained one gunshot to the cheek, one to the shoulder, two to the back, and one to the right wrist.
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