Police storm San Francisco's Jefferson Square Park - dubbed "Zombie Park" - in large-scale drug bust
Officers from multiple law enforcement agencies descended on San Francisco's Jefferson Square Park Wednesday evening, where rampant drug use earned it the name "Zombie Park," arresting dozens of people.
Shortly after 11 p.m., units from the San Francisco Police Department, the San Francisco Sheriff's Office, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, and other agencies swooped onto the park a few blocks west of City Hall, clearing out the public space that has recently become a haven for drug dealing and open-air drug use.
Police said 86 people were arrested on various charges and that the operation was a product of a new effort to stomp out illegal activity that seems to move from block to block.
"There's been this trend that we see where we go to an area, we clean it up, we stabilize it, and then a lot of the people that have been causing problems and havoc - particularly as it relates to the drug market - go into another neighborhood," said San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott on Thursday. "That day is over ... stop this whack-a-mole thing that we're seeing when drug dealers - and users - go from one community to the next when they get pressured. This pressure will not stop."
Police had recently cleared drug users and unhoused people from nearby Willow Street about two blocks away, and many ended up instead at Jefferson Park, according to published reports.
Scott added that some of the people arrested Wednesday night may be released, while others remain in custody. He said the bottom line is the city will take action, a stance the city's new mayor repeated on Thursday.
"This is a message that I want everyone in the city to hear," said Mayor Daniel Lurie. "If you are selling drugs in this city, we are coming after you."
Lurie was speaking Thursday at a press conference to announce that the weekend of Feb. 14-16, which included the NBA All-Star Game activities and the Chinese New Year Parade, was the safest since 2017, citing police department statistics.
Scott called the multi-agency operation a blueprint for what's to come, a first step in what he says will be an ongoing effort to break up large clusters of drug users and dealers.
"It was a massive undertaking," the chief said. "So it's not something that you're going to see every single day, but you will see this more often, and we're going to use this as a strategy to deal with this displacement that has been haunting us."
The people arrested are facing charges ranging from felony drug sales, to misdemeansor possession of drug paraphernalia, loitering and being in the park after hours. Of those taken into custody, their cases are now in the hands of District Attorney Brooke Jenkins, who said at least 30 had outstanding warrants for offenses as far away as Solano County.
"That puts them out of our county now in the hands of the county that needs to prosecute them and continue forward with their case. And so that does alleviate some of the burden on our system here, and really some of the conditions on our streets," Jenkins said.
For Supervisor Stephen Sherrill, whose district borders the park, Wednesday night's bust represents something much larger, a potential turning point for the city's long and complicated battle with drug use and public safety.
"It's not just about borders, it's about the city as a whole, and really working people most at risk, who maybe haven't been getting the attention that they deserve. And right now, Jefferson Square Park is at everybody's focus point," he said. "But I'm not going to let it move from that. We're going to continue to focus. We're going to continue to press"
The raid also highlights the city's struggle with displacement and questions of where the people pushed out of Jefferson Square will go next.
Supervisor Bilal Mahmood, who represents Jefferson Square and the Tenderloin says, it's a pressure campaign and coordination with City Hall that he believes will dissolve the open drug markets.
"Once you have the sting operations, once you have the severe crackdowns, you need to have ambassadors to hold the fort. That's what we're advocating for," Mahmood said.
For Scott, the operation's message extends beyond Jefferson Square itself, and the drug markets it targets, but returning city spaces back to residents.
"We're not going to tolerate this activity. And if you keep coming or coming to these locations and doing the same thing, we're going to arrest," Scott said. "And then the continuing offenses will allow us to hold people in jail who normally would have been released if it was the first time offense."
The enforcement effort is the latest action under the city's Drug Market Agency Coordination Center (DMACC), a multi-agency task force established to dismantle open-air drug markets across San Francisco.
