Board of Supervisors to approve SFPD misconduct settlement

By Brent Begin, Bay City News Service

April 10, 2007

SAN FRANCISCO (BCN) - The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is expected to approve an $82,500 settlement today in an alleged police misconduct incident at a local nightclub involving three San Francisco police officers and a visiting Sacramento man.

If approved, the settlement would end a three-year struggle for Andrew Marconi, who claims he was humiliated and intimidated by on-duty police officers at a club across the street from the city's Hall of Justice.

The lawsuit stems from a March 7, 2004 incident in which Marconi and some friends were outside The Endup, a popular late night dance club at the intersection of Sixth and Harrison streets.

According to charging documents, Marconi was urinating in an alleyway behind the club when a San Francisco police patrol car pulled up.

Three officers allegedly got out of the car and approached Marconi and his friend Eric Gora.

Marconi, who is gay, claims in the lawsuit that the officers began yelling homosexual slurs at him. One officer then allegedly told the two men, "You peeing on my streets? Do you think we want your AIDS-infected pee on our streets?"

In the lawsuit, Marconi claims one of the policemen grabbed his head, slammed it into a wall and then used his hair to mop up the urine.

According to charging documents, officers allegedly took Marconi's shirt off and continued to mop up the urine.

Marconi's friend, an off-duty Stockton police officer, witnessed the alleged incident and pulled out his badge, prompting the officers to flee.

Marconi, who lived in Sacramento at the time, never filed a complaint with the city's Office of Citizen Complaints and the incident was never taken before the police commission prior to his filing the lawsuit.

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