thriving Black commercial and cultural strip<\/a> before businesses and homes were razed for the development of BART and the post office across the street. The neighborhood was also the setting for much of the Black Panthers\u2019 organizing and community service activities.<\/p>\nSpeakers at the event had to pause frequently to wait out the rumble of BART trains passing on the tracks that run parallel to the building.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThis was a place where we were talking about Black economic independence, talking about Black people rising up from oppression and degradation,\u201d said Brown, explaining that she developed her building in that \u201cspirit.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe only time we\u2019ve ever had any windows broken or any damage to the building has been by the police themselves,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Brown previously told us she instructs staff and residents not to let law enforcement into the building without a warrant, primarily over concerns about ICE agents going after tenants. Several speakers noted that the semi-plainclothes outfits looked similar to unmarked uniforms often donned by immigration agents.<\/p>\n
Isaac Joseph, the resident in the unit SFPD searched, said he and his children were \u201cdevastated\u201d by the experience.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was too much for everybody,\u201d said Joseph, who emphasized that he hadn\u2019t done anything illegal and was shocked to see the police outside his apartment.<\/p>\n
Elected officials spoke in support of lawsuit claiming unlawful search and surveillance<\/p>\n
![\"black](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/black-panther-apartments-lawsuit-sfpd-13.jpg\")
The 2-year-old Black Panther building developed by Elaine Brown\u2019s Oakland & The World Enterprises has 79 units of affordable housing. Credit: Natalie Orenstein\/The Oaklandside <\/p>\n
The lawsuit alleges that SFPD violated the Fourth Amendment by unlawfully searching the property, used excessive force against staff, vandalized the building, and illegally arrested Johnson, among other claims.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce we are served, we will review the complaint and respond in court,\u201d said Jen Kwart, spokesperson for San Francisco City Attorney David Chiu, in an email to The Oaklandside.<\/p>\n
The lawsuit also alleges that an officer told building staff during the May incident that the department had been surveilling the building for the month prior.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot only did they have the building under surveillance with undercover cars and things like that, but they actually had searched the building\u2019s Wi-Fi, and also the Wi-Fi of the unit that they claim that they were here to search,\u201d Pointer said at the press conference. He took issue with the alleged surveillance, claiming SFPD either hadn\u2019t gotten a separate warrant to carry out this activity, or had failed to provide them with a copy of it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
We asked SFPD about these specific claims, but a spokesperson said the department can\u2019t comment on pending litigation.<\/p>\n
Some elected officials showed support at the press conference, including City Councilmember Charlene Wang and Assemblymember Mia Bonta, who spoke, Congresswoman Lateefah Simon, who had a statement read on her behalf, and Councilmember Ken Houston, who was in attendance.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Wang said that, as chair of the council\u2019s committee on public safety, the SFPD incident \u201cenrages\u201d her.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is not acceptable, nor is it lawful, and we are all obligated as elected leaders to demand accountability for this incident,\u201d said Wang, who does not represent West Oakland but said she was asked to attend by Brown. \u201cThis is law enforcement being used to criminalize and terrorize poor people.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the lawsuit, the plaintiffs claim that the Oakland Police Department coordinated with SFPD during the operation in May.<\/p>\n
\u201cOPD and the City of Oakland participated in, assisted with, facilitated, or subsequently ratified conduct that violated Plaintiffs\u2019 constitutional rights,\u201d they allege. However, they say the exact nature of OPD\u2019s involvement is unclear, and the legal inquiry is needed to determine that.<\/p>\n
When we asked OPD at the time, a department spokesperson said SFPD had requested that Oakland \u201cassist with crowd-control efforts.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cOPD was not involved in the arrest or in serving the search warrant, and its sole role was to provide crowd management support,\u201d spokesperson Paul Chambers told us in May.<\/p>\n
Asked if he\u2019s considering suing OPD as well as SFPD, Pointer on Thursday indicated that\u2019s a possibility.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnyone who played a role in the assault and the attack\u2026is on our list,\u201d he responded. \u201cSo we\u2019ll continue to move forward with the litigation, and as we uncover the people who are behind this, be sure you\u2019ll see them as a defendant in this case.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
OPD did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the lawsuit and this statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Shortly after the May incident, Oakland and San Francisco\u2019s police unions put out a joint statement saying the operation followed typical and lawful protocols for cross-city policing.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Oakland Police Department was informed about this suspect and the planned SFPD enforcement action,\u201d said Huy Nguyen, the Oakland union president, in that press release. \u201cOur members were ready to provide support to SFPD officers, and follow established procedures for interagency cooperation.\u201d<\/p>\n
We asked Wang about the potential implication of OPD in the lawsuit. She didn\u2019t provide a response by publication time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The lawsuit seeks financial damages from SFPD. It doesn\u2019t name a specific amount.<\/p>\n
Brown, 83, whose building stands at an intersection named in honor of her<\/a>, told the crowd Wednesday that she\u2019ll continue fighting for vulnerable residents: \u201cI\u2019m not dead yet.\u201d<\/p>\n“*” indicates required fields<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Elaine Brown\u2019s affordable housing company is suing the San Francisco Police Department, accusing officers of a \u201cmilitary-style, violent…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":466586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[380,20751,103462,143,145,144,407,101,14442],"class_list":["post-466585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-affordable-housing","tag-black-panthers","tag-elaine-brown","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news","tag-oakland-police-department","tag-san-francisco","tag-west-oakland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=466585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/466585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/466586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=466585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=466585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=466585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}