Photographer Travis Jensen reports that 21 20-year-old D'Paris Williams, a.k.a. “DJ,” a City College student, was assaulted by SFPD officers Friday afternoon for what appears to be no reason:

Yesterday afternoon, while riding his bicycle home from the Make A Wish Foundation's “Bat Kid” happenings, DJ was confronted by two undercover police officers in an unmarked vehicle at the Valencia Gardens Apartments in the City's Mission District. Apparently, the officers said something to DJ about riding his bicycle on the sidewalk as he was pulling up to his home in the complex. It is unclear whether the officers identified themselves or not, but did proceed to get out of their car, grab DJ from behind as he was entering the home and beat him for no apparent reason. A police search uncovered a cupcake and juice that DJ had just purchased from the corner store. Nobody has spoken to DJ since the incident occurred as he was immediately taken to S.F. General Hospital for treatment, and then to the 850 Bryant police station. So far, it appears no charges have been made against DJ either. There is building video surveillance footage of DJ's confrontation w/ police, but it that has yet to be released by housing authority. Furthermore, three residents came to DJ's aid when they saw officers beating him up, only to find themselves also under attack by officers. By this time, uniformed backup had arrived on the scene. Including DJ, a total of four individuals were beaten and arrested by officers.

As mentioned, after DJ was allegedly assaulted and taken to SF General, the Valencia Garden community spilled out into the street in protest of the violence.  Residents began filming and soon captured footage of officers attacking protesters.  Around 1:30, an officer can be seen punching a detained man on the ground:

That man, who can also be seen earlier in the video trying to pull an aggravated man away from officers and then being attacked, was later seen with his face bloodied:

We'll update as this story develops.

UPDATE 2:00pm: We're now getting more information about the incident.

We're told that the scene unfolded right as DJ was entering his house.  As he was questioned by undercover narcotic agents plainclothes officers from the Violence Reduction Team, the officer in the black baseball hat (pictured above) grabbed DJ and shoved his head into his front door.  DJ's sister, who was holding a newborn baby, was witness to the entire scene.  When she approached the door where DJ was being assaulted, a second officer pushed her.

They then dragged DJ into the street and punched him in the head until he was knocked out.  Others in lock-up with DJ report that he blacked out and has no recollection of what happened.  DJ is still in custody and not being allowed to speak to anyone; however, criminal charges are yet to be filed.

Currently two of the other three men who were arrested have been released.

We're told the man seen holding the cane in the video is a gay, HIV-positive man who needs his cane because of medical complications.  The police are continuing to hold him in custody, allegedly because his cane is being considered a “deadly weapon.”

Orlando (last name unknown), who had his face bloodied after pulling the man with the cane away from officers, was released “a few hours ago,” according to Travis Jensen.

UPDATE 7:45pm: We are still yet to receive a comment from SFPD about the incident.  We'll continue trying to reach someone from their Media Relations Department.

UPDATE 9:00am: SFPD just released this statement:

At approximately 3:41 PM Friday, officers from the Violence Reduction Team, working a plainclothes assignment attempted to stop a bicyclist in the area of Maxell and Rosa Parks for a California vehicle code infraction.  The suspect fled from the officers after they identified themselves as police.  The suspect attempted to flee into a residence.  The officers confronted the suspect near the doorway and requested additional units for assistance.  The suspect failed to comply with lawful orders from the officers and continued to resist the officers.  Reasonable force was used by the officers to effect the arrest.  During this incident, multiple subjects came from the rear of the residence and formed a hostile crowd around the officers.  One subject attempted to strike an officer with a cane, while another suspect bit an officer.  Two officers suffered non-life threatening injuries.  In total, 4 suspects were arrested. 2 felony and 1 misdemeanor arrests resulted in bookings.  One misdemeanor arrest resulted in a cite.

We have requested surveillance footage recorded by the SF Housing Authority and for comment on the officer who charged at a bystander. We'll update if we receive more word.

UPDATE 10:30am: SFPD denied our request for surveillance footage, saying:

The video surveillance is evidence for the assault and battery on the officers.

The officers have not been suspended.  There is a criminal investigation into the suspects that assaulted and battered the officers and resisted arrest.

Persons wishing to file a complaint may do so with the Office of Citizen's Complaints (OCC).

Williams is in court today facing four felony charges and one misdemeanor charge.  Orlando, who has been released, has reportedly claimed Williams has been in the infirmary most of the weekend and “looks like he was in a bad car accident.”

UPDATE 4:45pm: At Williams' arraignment at SF Superior Court this afternoon, his bail was set at $143k. Read on.

UPDATE 6:15pm: A new video showing Williams screaming in pain and unable to walk following the beating has been released.

UPDATE 9:30pm: KTVU is now reporting that the District Attorney has “discharged the case against Mr. Williams and another man pending further investigation.”

[Portrait by Travis Jensen]

It's been a cruel year for 24th Street's venerable crop dives, with Polk Gulch's Playland buying up Jack's Club and Zoe's replacing El Mexicano.  Now, Pop's Bar joins the list.  Reader “MoFoPlz” fills us in:

Pop's at 24th & York is in the process of being sold. The two current owners, Malia (owner of Thee Parkside) & Harmony, have accepted an offer and it's making it's way through the SF system. You'll have to follow up with them for details other than the rumor was it went for 250K+. Let's hope not to the douche who claims everything 'local' or some other dick who wants to clean it up and rebrand it for the Marina crowd.

We reached out to bar staff, but haven't been given a confirmation either way (and nothing has popped up on the bar's ABC license, so it hasn't made it that far yet).

The identity of the buyer (or buyers) isn't clear, but with the Mission's “hyper gentrification” looming over 24th Street, and Pop's being a place of $2 tallcans and $5 bloodies that start pouring at noon, we'd imagine the new owners would look to make the cocktail glass atop the sign a bit more prominent.

[Photo by Jeremy Brooks]

With Local: Mission Eatery, Local's Corner, and this week's opening of Local Mission Market and the announcement of Local Cellar, Yaron Milgrom's business empire continues to grow and make an impact on the neighborhood.  However, a string of complaints this year are beginning call his business practices into serious question.

According to a complaint filed in San Francisco Superior Court, Local: Mission Eatery's general manager “repeatedly harassed” server Ariel Rose “throughout the course of her employment,” despite the restaurant's owners being aware of the situation:

“[The General Manager] repeatedly engaged in sexual harassment through persistent, offensive comments based on sex, including but not limited to the following: commenting on PLAINTIFF's breast size, comparing PLAINTIFF's breast size to other employee's breast size, commenting on PLAINTIFF's weight and appearance, and repeatedly telling PLAINTIFF graphic details of his sexual encounters.”

After “repeatedly complaining” about the harassment, Rose formally met with Milgrom on January 8th to discuss the harassment.  Five days later, she was fired.

The general manager was still posting to Mission Eatery's Facebook wall as of July 16th, suggesting he was not terminated.

The lawsuit also alleges other employee abuses, including:

• Failure to provide employees with legally-mandated rest periods, or further compensating those employees as required by law.
• Not giving employees working more than 5 hours time to eat.
• “On at least one occasion,” the restaurant didn't pay employee's wages on a scheduled payday.
• Failure to provide earning statements for tax purposes.
• Not paying owed wages to the fired employee.
• Taking tips left for servers.

According to additional documents related to the case, “settlement discussions [have] reached an impasse” and the case is scheduled to go to trial in April 2014.

The lawsuit precedes another controversy for the “Local” businesses.  In April of this year, a Latino family alleged Local's Corner refused to seat them despite having available seating, implying it was racially-motivated discrimination.  Yaron later apologized for the incident, saying he was “deeply sorry” and it was “a huge failure to enact our commitment to everyone with whom to interact.”

As the tipster who sent us the server's complaint told us:

I'm starting to actually feel sorry for Yaron, despite having his weird empire of businesses, he's kind of the most hated person on this side of the Mission. But the attached does not do any good for his image at all.

We agree—the attacks on Yaron and his personal property have been, at times, overwhelming.  However, if any of these claims prove to be true, it casts a damning light on the man's business practices and general ethics.

Neither the Milgrom nor Rose have responded to emails for comment, but you can read the original complaint below:

[Photo by markevnic72]

Ever since the DeLano's at 23rd and South Van Ness closed down, southern Mission has been without a worthy supermarket within walking distance.  So when Yaron Milgrom of Local: Mission Eatery and Local's Corner fame announced plans to open a supermarket at 22nd and Harrison, I was hopeful—sure, it would likely be priced at Bi-Rite levels, but the space was huge and promising, and Milgrom himself proclaimed Local Mission Market would be “a full-service grocery store.”

“Everything you would expect to find at a European grocery store, we'll have here,” he told SF Weekly. “Tomato sauce, apple sauce, ketchup, mustard, pasta, crackers, breads — all house-made from scratch, just like we do at the restaurants.”

After two years of waiting, Local Mission Market finally opened their doors this week.  And wanting something other than expired Clif Bars for breakfast, I swung by this morning to grab something to eat.

Photo by Powen S.

It was immediately apparent that this wasn't a supermarket.  In fact, it didn't have any aisles, or really much of anything.  It's really more like a church bake sale with a cold case.  My hopes of getting some cereal or something that appeals to my childish dietary sensibilities was not going to happen.  I pressed on anyway.

I thought about doing yogurt with granola, but the yogurt came in giant jars that resembled boar semen sold in bulk.  Also, $9?  Hahahahaha! Good one, Yaron.

Next on my list of ideas was making an omelet.  The prices of the mushrooms gave me the chills, although I'm told these prices are about right (even if they're more expensive than what you can get at the Mission Community Market).  In fact, their entire produce section seemed reasonable—prices within the margins, quality that was undeniably choice.  But then again, they were trying to charge $4.50 for a dozen Rock Island eggs—the same dozen you can get at Rainbow and Duc Loi for over a dollar less.  And these high prices are from a for-profit grocer that just accepted $50k+ of free money on Kickstarter.

At this point, I resigned myself to eating my expired energy mash, but perused the store out of a sick desire for journalistic completeness.  $8 spaghetti, $12 tomato soup, $10 jar of pickles, San Andreas cheese for $45/pound. I rushed around to find a case of booze to make it all more tolerable, but they didn't even stock that.

In an interview with The Atlantic Cities, Milgrom reiterated the claim that this is a “one-stop market” with “prices that undermine or are at minimum competitive with other stores in the area.”

“People with a range of incomes should be able to shop here,” Milgrom says. “If you come here, you can shop affordably: talk with the butcher, talk with the staff, and see what great food you can make for less.”

Good luck with that, but I'll be holding out for a real grocer to revive the old DeLano's.