San Francisco: Murder victim identified, victim of police beating Dacari Spiers

Dacari Spiers, the man at the center of San Francisco’s historic 2021 police use of force criminal case, has been confirmed by the San Francisco Medical Examiner as the victim killed in Saturday morning’s shooting in the Mission.

Spiers was 36 years old when he was gunned down early Saturday near 15th Street and Wiese Alley.

In October 2019, San Francisco police officer Terrance Stangel struck an unarmed Spiers with a baton in the street after police were called to Spiers and his girlfriend near Fisherman’s Wharf. While a 911 caller claimed there was a domestic violence incident, Spiers and his then-girlfriend Breonna Richard had no contact when police arrived, and no domestic violence incident was ever confirmed.

According to body-worn camera footage, Officer Cuauhtémoc Martinez quickly became “hands-on” with Spiers, who physically resisted. Stangel then struck Spiers nine times with a telescopic metal baton. Spiers suffered a broken wrist and leg and ultimately won a $700,000 settlement from the city, the highest settlement in San Francisco since at least 2010.

Spiers’ fate attracted widespread attention when District Attorney Chesa Boudin filed the city’s first indictment against a San Francisco police officer for brutality on duty in 2021 – Spiers’ case was the first and only such case to go to trial. A jury found Stangel’s actions did not constitute a crime – acquitting Stangel on three counts and dismissing the fourth count.

A witness to Saturday’s shooting said he heard arguing in the alley between 15th and 16th streets around 4 a.m. before two shots were fired. What caused the shooting is unclear, and the shooter has not been arrested.

Rebecca Young, a prosecutor in the criminal case, said the beating was “not something (Spiers) could just brush off … it broke him.”

“It’s sad and tragic because Dacari is the classic child of trauma who was undiagnosed, untreated and unmedicated,” Young said. “And this is the result. Children who have had a traumatic childhood that was undiagnosed and untreated will spend their entire lives helpless.”

Spiers was a rapper under the name Mr. FYB and, according to his online music profile, he is the father of two sons. On Sunday, the woman he is in a relationship with posted a picture of the couple on Facebook with a broken heart emoji.