Defense attorney calls police reports related to Carmignani Marina District assault 'shocking'
SAN FRANCISCO -- Police reports on eight separate acts of violence targeting homeless individuals living on the streets of San Francisco's Marina District have shed new light on the brutal assault of former San Francisco Fire Commissioner Don Carmignani.
That was the claim Wednesday of public defender Kleigh Hathaway, the attorney who is representing Garret Allen Doty, the 24-year-old homeless man charged in the Carmignani case.
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Hathaway stood in the hallway of San Francisco Superior Court, talking with reporters after her client's preliminary hearing was delayed by 24 hours at the request of San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins.
"We were notified by Mr. Carmignani's lawyers, the victim in the case, that Mr. Carmignani was not available to testify today," Jenkins said at an afternoon press conference. "He is a necessary witness in this case for a number of reasons given many factual allegations that have come up. Without him present to testify, that created evidentiary problems for us."
Hathaway seemed surprised that Jenkins was going to pursue the case after the district attorney and police provided her with reports on the homeless attacks.
"When I first spoke with you all [the media] I said this was going to be a case of self defense and that was before we knew much of what we have learned in the last 24 hours," Hathaway said. "It's dismaying to find that the prosecutor is continuing with the prosecution in light of the fact that the district attorney and police now have reason to believe that Mr. Carmignani was involved in eight separate acts of violence. These eight separate acts of violence were perpetrated against people who are homeless."
"The District Attorney and the police gave us, the defense, yesterday these police reports because they believe these acts are related to Mr. Carmignani."
Hathaway said when she reviewed the reports, she was shocked by their content.
"I have reviewed these police reports, they date back to November of 2021," she told reporters. "The most recent one of January 2023. In all all of them, the victims are not housed."
"The victims are either asleep, in their tents, sitting on a bench, minding their own business," Hathaway said. "And in all of them, this man who is described as 6 feet, 6-foot-1, 280, 300 pounds. Gray hair, brown hair, very similar, matching what Mr. Carmignani looks like. So these incidents are being reported over the last two years and fortunately one of them was caught on video."
"That video is shocking," she added.
On the hazy surveillance video, a large man is seen spraying a homeless man, who is lying in a sleeping bag, with a large can of bear spray.
During her afternoon press conference Wednesday, Jenkins mostly addressed the case against Doty and said that police have not submitted any video to her office for charging purposes.
"I have viewed a video, and right now it's simply an allegation of who it is, so there is more investigation that needs to take place surrounding that," said Jenkins.
Jenkins did say that her office currently had no plans to drop the case against Doty, but allowed that the suspect might be released if Carmignani does not testify in the case.
The San Francisco District Attorney's Office has issued a subpoena for Carmignani after he was a no show in court Wednesday.
In his first public statements since the attack on Tuesday, Carmignani told KPIX the District Attorney's office had alerted his lawyer that they will be moving to dismiss the case based on new evidence that they have received - video of a person prosecutors claim is Carmignani using bear spray against homeless people in another incident.
Carmignani denies he is the person in the video and said the decision to dismiss the case came as a surprise to him.
He is still healing from his severe injuries and said his doctor told him if his attacker hit him in a particular spot one more time, he would have lost his life.
"When I was running away, the impact hit my skull," he said. "They cracked my jaw from here all the way down and they put a plate in from here all the way here."
Carmignani's attorney said the assistant district attorney said the office now considers the incident self-defense and indicated other evidence of attacks on homeless people believed to have been committed by Carmignani has led to the decision to dismiss the case.
"I didn't go out there to fight anyone. I'm trying to get them down the road, go to the park," said Carmignani. "It's three-on-one. I know odds. I'm 52 years old. I have two hip replacements. I'm an old guy, I could have been a dead guy."
Carmignani says now he may even be prosecuted for discharging pepper spray.
"I used the spray as self-defense. I never went after him," he told KPIX. "I never went across the street to try and fight him. That was never my goal."
He said he actually misused the pepper spray and sprayed himself during the attack, never hitting the suspect.
Carmignani noted neither the police department nor the DA's office has interviewed him to get his version of the events.
