These stories were submitted by providers, staff, and community members at San Francisco General Hospital.
TW: racism, violence
“That hospital is a mess and as a person of color I did not feel safe with [SFSD] presence.”
— Rotating Student
“As a longtime provider in the Latinx community, I have had noted that the presence of law enforcement dampens the ability of my patients to access care.”
— UCSF Volunteer
“Many experiences where children and pregnant people had sheriffs called for no other reason than a person was needed to help manage conflict. In every instance the sheriffs escalated conflict.”
— UCSF Provider
“SFSD presence brings harm and makes People of Color and people who are undocumented unsafe when they seek healthcare. This is a public health issue and they need to be removed.”
— Student
“The sheriffs [at SFGH] told a patient I was working with to speak English since she was in America.”
— Community Member
“One of my patients told me that she would never come to the SFGH Emergency Room because of the armed sheriff presence in the ER. She had a past history of incarceration and told me that she saw sheriffs in our ER who also work in the county jails. She feared they would mistreat her while in the hospital since they had mistreated her while in custody.”
— UCSF Resident
“On multiple occasions I have witnessed SFPD officers and SF deputies laugh and make fun of our patients while standing just right outside the door to their room within earshot of the patient.”
— UCSF Resident
“I took care of a SF County jail patient who was hospitalized for a foot infection that spread to his bloodstream and spine. Despite the fact that he was very cooperative, his foot was partially amputated and he couldn't walk, the pt was required to be handcuffed to the bed 24/7 which ended up causing wounds on his wrists. After being handcuffed to the bed for over a week, his muscles had significantly deconditioned and weakened. We advocated that it was medically necessary for him to be able to sit in a chair and work with physical therapy, but the sheriffs would not remove the handcuffs/shackles which likely contributed to his further deconditioning”
— UCSF Resident
“One of my primary care patients was shot by SFPD when he was a teenager and as a result he is now paraplegic and has many resulting health problems. I have sat with him multiple times in our emergency room while he is waiting for hospital admission and seen him become agitated and paranoid that the sheriffs in the ED are secretly talking about him and are "out to get him" even though they haven't interfaced with the patient. This is one example of how the sheriff's presence alone can cause trauma or trigger PTSD.”
— UCSF Resident
“I was caring for a patient in the emergency room who wanted to leave the hospital, but was very confused and did not have the capacity to make that decision. His family members had agreed he needed to be kept in the hospital against his will to keep him safe so he could get treated for an infection. I called the sheriff for assistance. They told me that they would not help me unless the patient was placed on a psychiatric legal hold (even though the patient did not have a known underlying psychiatric diagnosis and therefore wasn't eligible for this type of hold) because otherwise the sheriffs wouldn't have enough legal liability protection in case the patient was injured. We need a security team who does not assume force is the primary intervention and who helps us protect all patients, including those who don't have capacity to make decisions and are on medical or surrogate holds, not just psychiatric holds”
— UCSF Resident
“We had a pregnant patient with an intensely violent relationship with the father of her baby…we held several meetings with the Sheriff’s Department who reassured us they would be available as close backup but would not get involved unless asked by her medical team. Instead, they approached our patient without her consent or our asking WHILE SHE WAS IN LABOR to get a statement from her about his whereabouts and about his past crimes (including issues not related to his violence towards her). This was not only deeply traumatizing to her, it put her at increased risk of violence by the [father of the baby]...when we met again with the sheriffs after this incident, they were defensive and had absolutely no insight into why this was problematic, including that they had gone against what we had agreed upon as a plan prior to her delivery.”
— UCSF Provider
“The sheriffs must be removed. They continually harm BIPOC patients with impunity especially at the whims of white providers who ‘feel threatened’ with no real concrete reasons as to why.”
— Former UCSF medical student
“I’ve seen them shackle pregnant women, over step their boundaries in hospital settings, be more aggressive than necessary with patients.”
— Former Provider
“Patient was in Labor. Her partner was arrested upon entrance to SFGH because he was holding drugs. People should not be policed when they are coming in to have a baby. Had the patient chosen to deliver at another hospital, her partner would have been there during her labor course and the delivery of her child. How can we honestly call our hospital a safe space when police are the security?”
— UCSF Provider
“I experienced SFSD violently restrain and transfer a pregnant women of color from bed to wheelchair in order to move her to a Psych unit. Her arms were zip tied behind her back and she was screaming about pain in her wrists and they did nothing to address the pain and discomfort she was experiencing.”
“I witnessed two individuals having a verbal altercation…one appeared to be a Black female and the other a White male. The woman was sitting, while the man had a cart full of cans that he was intermittently thrusting forward while threatening the woman. Both were yelling without physical contact. In a few minutes, multiple members of the SFSD arrived and started aggressively communicating with the woman while more calmly taking to the man. Within minutes the woman was on the ground getting handcuffed. I repeatedly tried to speak up to the officers requesting to understand why she was being restrained despite being the one who had been sitting and getting explicitly threatened by the man who was not being detained. To say that I was frustrated by being ignored initially and then treated flippantly when forcing my statement to be taken would be an incredible understatement. At least two other employees who were there also spoke up to confirm my statements. As I have an afternoon clinic, I could not go to the station with the officers, which one officer said was "typical" so as to indicate that I was not committed to standing up for the woman. I immediately told him that I would provide my email and cell phone to be contacted on her behalf and requested the phone number I could call to follow up. I was never contacted and when I attempted to call in the following day, I was just given the run around before being told that someone would reach out to me if needed. I am horrified to know that the woman might have been incarcerated for a "crime" that I repeatedly offered to speak about just because the criminal justice rigged things against her by ignoring the truth that was being offered in her defense. I now know to be more proactive about collecting information like officers’ badge numbers and the like, but I also know that the issue is in the system itself that fails to really center itself on justice and safety. I wholeheartedly agree with Asmara that SFSD has no business being in our healthcare settings given the evidence base of crimes committed by them and trauma they wreck on patients, families and staff both physically and psychologically.”
— UCSF Provider
“An elderly patient of mine on the inpatient service was having delusions and getting agitated. The sheriffs were called… when they arrived, they just yelled at the patient in English, even though the patient was Spanish speaking, telling him to calm down. Obviously, this did not help. We were eventually able to deescalate as a care team, but the sheriffs just made things worse.”
— UCSF Provider
“The patients I serve in the mission district are continuously being harassed and harmed by SFSD presence at SFGH. They would rather not go to the hospital than have to deal with their presence, even if not harassed by them. Why are hospitals that are supposed to be healing spaces creating FEAR?!”
— Community Member
“Multiple situations where security being called led to escalation of tension, especially when patients noticed the officers’ guns.”
— UCSF Provider
“I have seen SFSD involvement escalate situations with patients and lead to poorer outcomes.”
— UCSF Provider
“I was working in the ED a few years ago and was caring for a young man who was under the influence of substances. He was quite agitated and needed medications to calm down. The SFSD were helping until in a moment of agitation the patient ran down the hallway. They caught him, and one of the officers placed his knee on the back of the patient’s neck to restrain him. The officer removed his knee when I yelled for him to do so.”
—UCSF Provider
“There is or was a huge Blue Lives Matter flag in their office. When I worked for an outside agency and was required to go to the sheriff office for temporary door access I saw it as I exchanged my ID for the door badge. The Blue Lives Matter counter movement sits in direct opposition to Black Lives Matter. Seeing the flag was deeply upsetting. There is deep divide between the kind of care so many of us wish to provide to our community and the continued harm inflicted by both the healthcare system and policing of Black and Brown bodies.”
— UCSF Student