The captain of San Francisco’s Mission District police station will hold a meeting with residents tonight to discuss police efforts to stem gang-related violence, which left three men dead over the weekend.
Police are still trying to figure out what triggered the initial hostilities, but the conflict is believed to be between separate factions of Nortenos, police spokeswoman Sgt. Lyn Tomioka said.
Word. The meeting will be held tonight at Mission Educational Projects, Inc. at 6 p.m., and will be hosted by Mission Station police Captain Stephen Tacchini.
Address is 3049 24th St. at Treat, if you’d like to attend.
Authorities said they would take several steps in response to the violence, including increasing beat patrols along Mission Street, adding cars to parts of the Mission and Ingleside neighborhoods and doubling the number of school resource officers at Mission High School.
The article features further comment by police officials as well as profiles of victims of recent shootings. Link.
Suddenly I heard the high-pitched pops of Chinese firecrackers right outside the restaurant’s front window—one, then two more, then yelling, then something in my gut made me whisper, “Get down!” and I grabbed the wife and we hit the concrete floor about the same moment as everyone else. We heard more pops and people running outside. I glanced up and saw women in dresses sprawled flat, men in suits, busboys, waiters, napkins, bits of food…anybody looking in from outside would’ve seen a desolate restaurant full of empty chairs.
As you can see here, the celebratory closing night of Cardburg became decidedly destructatory after midnight. Shouts of “Fuck yeah!” filled the air as attendees ripped cardboard buildings from their foundations and beat each other with the detritus.
On my way home, I ran into a blockade on Mission Street. Buses were being rerouted onto South Van Ness, police were canvassing passersby, and somebody was shouting about somebody getting shot. SFPD homicide Lieutenant Mike Stasko explains in the Chronicle:
Apparently, there were three prior stabbings in that area – this may be someone coming up, doing retribution. He was a Latin male, on the street, he may have been in the wrong place, or wearing the wrong color. [Link]
I made my way down to 24th Street, and found another ruckus outside Carlos Club. “Get the [expletive] out of here!” said one man, as another was flung out the door. He pulled himself up, pulled his belt off, and whipped it at the one what flung ‘im, buckle first. Man did not take kindly to belt buckle to the face, so he struck his assailant with a bottle. Assailant went down, but got up quick, likely thanks to pure adrenaline. Punches were thrown. This guy was outnumbered; he took hits to the face and gut, was kicked hard in the lower back, and thrown into traffic. He fell, got back up, fell, got back up, steadied himself on a car parked in front of McDonald’s, and tried to make structure gonflable a phone call. I got the fuck out of there.
Cardburg was such a creative endeavor, but it all ended in violence. (Also, there were a hell of a lot of staples in that city; how many destructors came away with tiny staple wounds to their face, arms and necks?) What’s more, what was with all the intricately detailed cardboard shotguns? All these arty white people and their play violence; all these thugged-out brown people and their real violence. What’s the story?
