Vehicle Boosting Biggest Crime Problem in Park

By Andrew Sywak

On the night of Jan. 6, a 76-year-old monk named Yu Sou Sik took an evening stroll in Golden Gate Park. At Sixth Avenue and Fulton Street, he was robbed by knifepoint by a suspect who stabbed him three times after he handed over his money.

The monk has since recovered from his wounds, but the suspect is still at large.

The occurrence of this serious crime begs the question: Just how safe is Golden Gate Park?

A 1,077-acre maze of roads, soccer fields, meadows, jogging trails and dense eucalyptus and redwood groves, Golden Gate Park can appear as an ideal hideaway for criminals. Yet, after reviewing crime statistics and interviewing police officers, neighborhood groups and homeless people who live in the park, evidence suggests that the stabbing of Sik was an unusual crime in a relatively safe place.

According to statistics provided by the Richmond Police Station - the station responsible for patrolling the vast majority of the park - there were 215 reported incidents of crime committed there since April, 2003. Nearly 140 of these were "auto boosts," or crimes in which a suspect smashed a vehicle's window to take an item. There were less than 20 violent crimes during the past year, including one homicide in March in the parking lot at Ocean Beach.

Statistically, roughly three-quarters of reported crimes involve crimes to automobiles. A visitor to the park is about eight times more likely to be the victim of an auto-related crime than a violent crime.

Police Role in Golden Gate Park

Three different police stations patrol Golden Gate Park. The Park Station is responsible for a small portion on the park's east side extending west from Stanyan Street to Bowling Green Drive and north to Conservatory Drive West. The Richmond Station patrols everything west from about Sixth Avenue to Ocean Beach. The Mounted Patrol, based at stables near the Polo Fields, complements the two stations by patrolling the park's back trails that squad cars cannot access.

Sergeant Phil Downs, senior officer at the Mounted Patrol, concedes his unit is "pretty strapped" due to budget cuts.

"On a lucky day, we put two horses out," he said.

Patrolman Gary Mendribil is one of two Richmond Station officers who patrol Golden Gate Park.

"That is far-and-away the most popular crime in Golden Gate Park - theft from a locked auto," he says, adding that perhaps 50 percent of auto boosts go unreported to police. According to Mendribil, the area near Stow Lake and the northern border of Strybing Arboretum are the most popular areas for auto crimes to occur.

According to police statistics, violent crime is not prevalent in the park. There were 14 cases of aggravated assault in the last year and no documented cases of rape.

"When we get them (assaults), it's in the summer," Mendribil says, adding that most assaults are alcohol related.

Mendribil admitted that the area near Ocean Beach can be unsafe due to people drinking there. Curiously, city police jurisdiction extends only to the walls separating the parking lot at Ocean Beach from the beach itself. A beach patrol from the Golden Gate National Recreation Area is responsible for the beach.

Homeless in the Park

Much police work - perhaps the majority - in Golden Gate Park revolves around dealing with illegal camping by the many homeless who live there. While estimates of the total number of homeless in the City range from 8,000 to 14,000, no one has a guess as to how many live in Golden Gate Park.

"When I'm not investigating a crime, I spend most of my time dealing with (the homeless)," Mendribil says.

Every morning, officers from the Park and Richmond stations break up camping sites (all camping is illegal in the park) and issue about a dozen citations, which carry a $76 penalty and a notice to appear in court. Mendribil says he gives out around four citations a day, issuing most of them in the east side of the park. The Park Station claims to give out about four a day and Downs says his unit gives out four to seven citations a week.

"When the weather gets warm, starting in April, there's a big influx of young people coming to San Francisco," Mendribil says about the campers. "I've seen IDs from every state in the union."

L.S. Wilson of the San Francisco Homeless Coalition, acknowledges that the police are "in between a rock and a hard place" dealing with the homeless population but is critical of how police actions undermine their civil rights.

"Quality-of-life laws are tools used to harass people and move them from place to place in the City," Wilson says.

Homeless people are targeted for the crime of not having a home," he says. "What are they supposed to do?"

Nearby residents of the park are split over the threat, if any, homeless campers in the park hold in their neighborhood.

"When we've been here, I've never seen anybody suspicious," says 12-year Inner Sunset District resident Deanna Chu at the Sharon Art Studio. "I don't feel threatened by them (the homeless)."

Some area residents voiced concerns about venturing into the pedestrian entrance at the end of Haight Street, also known as Alvord Lake. A Cole Valley resident said she "definitely has some concerns about the area."

A homeless man named Gabe, collecting bottles near Alvord Lake, dismissed such concerns.

"Every once in a while someone goes crazy," he said. "I've been here a long, long time and sometimes people mysteriously disappear, but if you're asking me if it's a safety concern of mine, no, not really."

According to statistics provided by the Park Police Station, there were only three reported assaults in the Alvord Lake area since Jan. 1. The majority of the crime reported by the Park Station pertain to narcotics, suspicious occurrences or missing juveniles.

"We have occasional beefs between the locals and the street people," Sgt. Mark Porto of the Park Station said. "But 90 percent of the time, the beef is between the group."

"It's really a surprise," Mendribil says. "For the amount of people who use the park, there's not much crime there. I think it's a very safe place."