New Video Challenges SFPD Version Of Fatal Pursuit

SAN FRANCISCO, CA — Police pursued Edwin Adams in unmarked vehicles and tackled him from his electric scooter before he struck a bus shelter pole and died, according to the San Francisco Public Defender’s Office.

The office released footage of the encounter and filed a complaint with the Department of Police Accountability asking the city’s police watchdog to investigate and initiate discipline against the officers involved.

The complaint alleges unlawful pursuit and excessive force, and challenges the San Francisco Police Department’s public account of how Adams, 56, died while riding a scooter in SoMa.

Adams was facing nonviolent drug charges when San Francisco police in unmarked vehicles pursued him along Mission Street.

The Police Department said at the time that officers had spotted a man wanted on a warrant near Mission and Eighth streets.

Police reported that Adams collided with a street fixture and hit his head.

When officers tried to arrest him, he fled on the scooter and “collided with a street fixture,” according to a press report.

The Public Defender’s Office challenged that account today.

“Police chose to pursue Mr. Adams in multiple unmarked vehicles and then violently tackle him from his scooter,” said Zac Dillon, a Public Defender’s Office analyst.

“SFPD's public account of this incident was sparse and misleading, omitting the police actions that immediately preceded the collision, which led to Mr. Adams’s death.”

According to the Public Defender’s Office, the police account omitted the actions of officers in two unmarked vehicles who pursued Adams at high speed and tried to cut him off, followed by an officer tackling him immediately before the collision.

San Francisco police said the District Attorney’s Office is independently investigating whether police use of force caused Adams’s death.

Adams was on electronic monitoring while facing nonviolent drug charges.

His only warrant was a Sheriff’s Affidavit Warrant for allegedly failing to properly charge his ankle monitor—a nonviolent, administrative allegation, according to the Public Defender’s Office.

He died before he could challenge the drug charges in court, the office said.

“Mr. Adams was a father and a brother, and his family is grieving his untimely death,” said his attorney, Deputy Public Defender Meenha Lee.

Lee learned about the sheriff’s warrant only after Adams died. The Public Defender’s Office said staff had repeatedly asked the Sheriff’s Department, which administers pretrial electronic monitoring and issues those warrants, to notify the office when warrants are issued for its clients.

The Sheriff’s Department has refused those requests while promptly notifying the District Attorney’s Office, according to the Public Defender’s Office.

Such warrants generally concern technical monitoring issues rather than public safety concerns, according to the office.

“Had our office been notified of the sheriff warrant, we could have helped him resolve the issue,” Lee said.

The complaint challenges the pursuit under the Police Department’s vehicle pursuit policy, which limits officers’ authority to initiate pursuits to situations involving at least reasonable suspicion of a felony or a violent misdemeanor. Neither circumstance applied to Adams, the complaint alleges.

The complaint also argues that tackling Adams while he rode without a helmet endangered him, the officer, and potentially nearby members of the public. It cites the department’s use-of-force policy, which requires objectively reasonable force under the circumstances known to the officer.

Finally, the complaint alleges that police violated department rules on honesty by describing the collision without disclosing the police actions that preceded it.

“High-speed police pursuits of people riding electric scooters can have deadly consequences. Police should not be putting lives at risk over situations that could be resolved without a dangerous pursuit,” Public Defender Mano Raju said.

“His family deserves answers, and the public deserves a full and accurate accounting of what happened.”