here, or law enforcement? can we bring law enforcement in here, please? sir, if you could please help keep order within the hearing room, we appreciate a little help. thank you very much. pardon the interruption. >> this is relevant to the opinion regarding batterers and firearms. the relevance is discussed in paragraphs 82 through 84 of her declaration. chairperson hur: i would and by -- invite mr. kopp or mr.

waggoner to respont. -- respond. >> i admire creative lawyering as much as anybody. i am almost at a loss. the original return charges gave no evidence about this. there is a real danger, without being flippant, of permiting this to morph as we go along. we could end up with a situation whereby the time we are all done, we get a new amendment, with new issues to deal with. i think these paragraphs in this exhibit are irrelevant. they are of such little probative value that it is a waste of time to even be talking about it. that is the reason for our objection. i am happy to answer any questions. chairperson hur: setting aside

the question between paragraph 26 and the london declaration, what about the argument that her graf 26 -- that paragraph 26 has to do with alleged failure to transfer firearms appropriately? why isn't the testimony relevant? >> i do not think that is relevant to any of the charges, here. i am not sure that i can elaborate any further on that. chairperson hur: any other questions for mr. kopp?

here is my view on this. i do not think that the alleged dishonest statements have been sufficiently alleged in the charges. i do think the charges to sufficiently alleged the failure to appropriately transfer the firearms. that said, in light of what i thought this hearing was going to be focused on, i think it is a close call as to whether we want to open the door to allegations about whether it should have gone to the police department or the sheriff's department. without the allegations relating to dishonesty, it does not seem like even if we were to find that this happened that it would constitute official

misconduct. all of that is to say i am inclined to sustain the objection to per crapo 27 -- two paragraphs -- to paragraphs 27 et cetra. -- et cetera. any other questions from the commissioner specs -- commissioners? is there a motion to sustain the

objection to the paragraphs in exhibit 7? commissioner renne: so moved. chairperson hur: what did i say? 27 through 32. commissioner renne: so moved. chairperson hur: is there a second? is there a second? commissioner liu: i will second. chairperson hur: all in favor? opposed? the motion passes, 4-1. paragraphs 27 through 32, the objection is sustained. they will be excluded. exhibit 7 will be excluded. we still have the issue of exhibit 4, the video. i would like to reserve discussion of the video until we get through some of the other

decorations, if that is ok with the commission and the parties. any objection to that? ok. the next declaration is that of callie williams. mr. keith or ms. kaiser? >> chairman, if i might suggest, i think a lot of the admissibility arguments may turn on the arguments about the admissibility of the ivory williams decoration. the argument might be too abstract if we do not go first to ms. mattison. chairperson hur: here is my concern. we received that declaration only recently, and i do not believe the sheriff's team has had an opportunity to submit written objections.

in scheduling discussions i had with the parties, i did ask if the council could be prepared to orally discuss the objections, if any, to ms. mattison. are you prepared to do that? ok. why don't we -- >> i am. chairperson hur: thank you. [inaudible] chairperson hur: before we get to -- i think it is a good suggestion. before we get to ms. madison and ms. williams, i have a couple of questions, in light of the rulings on the other witnesses. do i understand that you will

not -- obviously, you will not have any need to cross-examine paul henderson. do you have any need to cross- examine wendy still? vicki hennessy? richard danielle? i guess we are waiting on exhibit 4. are you going to be challenging the chain of custody of the video, or anything like that? >> no. chairperson hur: no need to cross-examine? >> correct. chairperson hur: that is helpful. thank you. >> i thought i put this in an e- mail. it is possible not everybody got it. chairperson hur: you did? i may have missed it. thank you. the other thing i wanted to ask was about christine florence -- florez.

there was potentially a loophole in the order. we did not request objections to testimony. we did not receive any objections to the transcript. does that mean you are not checked into the -- objecting to the testimony submitted with respect to ms. flores? >> i may have misunderstood. i think i made clear our objections at the last hearing, that we would continue to maintain an objection to her testimony as being not relevant to the issues, given the fact that the sheriff has already submitted his declaration concerning misconduct. the only reason i can see that ms. flores, her testimony might -- testimony might be relevant, would be if he denied that. i have not submitted any thing in writing yet.

i do not recall the timing. the information to not come until after the bulk of the -- chairperson hur: i think we got them with the fact witnesses, as i recall, but maybe you can elaborate. >> there was, i guess -- the order only spoke to declarations, so it did not occur to us. we did put it in with our objections, but it did not cross our minds. i do not begrudge my opponents the opportunity to submit a written objection. i think it probably would make sense. chairperson hur: do you have a response to the oral objection with respect to ms. flores? >> yes. again, i was not anticipating we would raise the subtraction, but i think i can outline the issue. we're certainly happy to provide further information.

this is an important issue. in domestic violence-related cases, the evidence code permits the admission of other acts of domestic violence. the legislation has recognized that battering conduct happens repeatedly by a better. they have made a special determination that this type of evidence can be admitted to be considered about whether the domestic violence incident actually occurs. in addition, this evidence is relevant to nancy lyman's declaration because of the severity of the incidents as described. those are the basic reasons we believe this is invincible. -- admissable. chairperson hur: what about the

argument that the physical abuse is not being disputed in this case? >> i think it is. we will find out, perhaps -- when we do hear from the sheriff, we might find out more information than the sentence or two in the declaration. certainly, the account ms. lopez gave signified an incident which looked a lot more severe than an arm grab at the end. this is certainly relevant. chairperson hur: i think he might -- the commission might benefit -- to the commissioners have questions for mr. keith? do any members of the commission have views on this floor aztecs -- ms. florez?

commissioner renne: i have serious questions as to whether it is relevant and should be admitted. i am not convinced at this time that it is relevant to the issues we have to decide, in spite of the fact that you say may be in a trial of domestic violence it might come in. i am not sure, in view of what will be the sheriff's testimony, i think it is more prejudicial. the testimony, as i understand it, was taken in camera, because the judge felt it was something that should not be a public record, at least at that point. maybe you can answer the question. was it ever released to the

public? >> it was. the hearing occurred over two days, and it was a 402 hearing, which is fairly standard, when this type of evidence is permitted. the judge had initially had it closed. he opened it on the second day. the materials did become public. we have checked with ms. flores. she was comfortable with us submitting this. the judge did not necessarily -- the judge, i think, held an in camera hearing for her benefit more than anybody else. it was not the evidence was -- and the domestic violence issue has sensitivity. this r of legal interpretation. for purposes of official misconduct, as a matter how serious the domestic violence issue is? i am not prepared to say that it does not matter.

perhaps the ultimate decision by the commission will be that the seriousness of an incident does not matter, but i think we would be cutting off that potential issue far too early if we say all that matters is the fact that an incident occurred and a sentence came out of it. chairperson hur: if i understand your view, if evidence comes in that the physical conduct was beyond what was stated in mr. mercury me's declaration -- mr. mirkarimi's declaration, you think that makes it relevant? >> if it is relevant what happened in a domestic violence incident, the declaration is relevant. it tells us whether this was a onetime accident, or whether it was a conscious use of power to

cause an injury. chairperson hur: if it is conceded that it was not an accident -- if the fact you are seeking to establish is conceded, why do we need to bolster that fact? >> because the money goes not just to the existence of domestic abuse, but a pattern of abuse of power within a relationship that goes with it. that makes her testimony relevant. it shows that this is occurring within a domestic violence -- within, basically, a batterer mentality. there is a batterer way of being in relationships. that makes it more likely that this incident occurred, and that there is abuse of power not just within the relationship, but abuses of political power are more likely to be true.

suggests domestic violence is an exercise of power as opposed to a loss of temper. it would still be relevant to that power issue. i want to return to the original point. does it matter at all how serious an underlying issue is? if it does, we do not want to cut off that line of inquiry. chairperson hur: i am inclined to agree with mr. renne on this. that said, there were no written objections. mr. keith, you orally advocated, but if you would like the opportunity to submit written objections, given that mrs. flores is not coming in to testify, we could wait for written objections, if the

commission agrees and the parties agreed. any comments on that? commissioner renne: written objections by who? by the sheriff? chairperson hur: they would be submitted by the sheriff, and the mayor would be able to respond. commissioner hayon: commissioner liu: -- commissioner liu: i do want to see the briefings. it does seem like until the sheriff has testified we may not really know the extent and the parameters of the fact we are looking at. i do not think i would be comfortable out right excluding this. not before we know the scope of the facts, or what the concessions are. chairperson hur: i agree with that. if the parties -- if you feel you would like to add to your

aural objections in writing, that is fine. how we would ask for a response within three days of receiving the objections, or three business days. >> my suggestion would be that we keep it off of the sheriff's testimony, so the parties have an opportunity. chairperson hur: i think that is a good idea. ok. ivory madison. it is among declaration. i am trying to think of the best way to go about doing this.

my initial inclination was to go paragraph by paragraph, consecutively, and for you to identify any portions you object to. i welcome the views of my fellow commissioners on whether is a more efficient way to handle it. commissioner renne: i do not know if there is a more efficient way. i have to say, addressing the city attorney's office, that i was disappointed by the contents of the declaration. i think a first-year lawyer recognize that much of it is in admissible -- inadmissable, and should not be presented for us. rather than going part of prepare graf, which would emphasize the prejudicial nature of -- rather than

i will be disposed that we don't need her at all and you can bring ler as a live witness to bring her in for those portions that legitimately can be brought before us rather than the kind of statements that are being made. we will go back to some of them and they are clearly here say, appear to have solely the purpose of sort of poisoning the well in this hearing. and i don't think that's what your responsibility. is your responsibility is to present the case fairly with the facts that relate to the charge. obviously, being a public document, the newspapers pick it up. it gets bandied about with no opportunity to deal with.

so that -- my pro-posal may be extreme but my proposal would be that we reject the declaration and to allow you to bring ms. madison in and you can question her and we would have an opportunity if objections are raised to rule on that as to relevancey and as toed a minutesbility. -- and as to admissibility. >> i was going second that. commissioner >> i fully understand the criticism. we are in a situation where we have an independent witness who's represented by council. and we don't have control over what the witness submits and the way that i would -- had i been prepare this is declaration for my client, i may have proceeded differently and i may not have included everything that ms.

madison included. she is an independent witness and the way we're pursuing by declaration, we don't have the kind of -- i mean, i think for the reasons that you -- the alternative procedure you raced is because we are proceeding by declaration we don't have the decision by the presenting lawyer when somebody's represented by council about what questions to ask and the order in which to take things. so i think the criticism is well taken. and we certainly didn't intend to put matters before the commission that -- that are not relevant. she's not our client. we didn't have control of how she drafted. with regard to the procedure i may very well not contest some of the decisions. we may agree that some of this is admissible. it's useful to go through the declaration an hear the objections because it is going

to make the procedure of taking testimony shorter. so that would be my suggestion. but i understand and appreciate the criticism. >> thank you, mr. keith. >> my concern when you say that you didn't have control over the witness and that she had her own attorney but you were the one that submitted the declaration. so you had to have looked at it. so you could have said to her attorney, these paragraphs are not relevant or they're prejudicial and they don't relate to the issues but i accept the difficult you have under those circumstances. but again, the problem i have with going over paragraph by paragraph is that if -- in order to do that we simply have to repeat the same things that are being said and out into the mass

media. the mass media can look at it now. in fact, when this was filed, the next day the chronicle had portions of what was in there -- in their story. fortunately, they didn't go into all the details but that's the very thing that -- and when i saw that i thought to myself, maybe this idea of going by declarations was not necessarily the most protective of the interests of everybody because if you had asked or if the witness were alive and started to ask a question about something, objections we made an it never gets into the record because you never get to answer. and so that's the -- >> so i guess i would be more inclined to have mr. kopp

prepare a written objection to the paragraph by paragraphs because there are some paragraphs that are clearly jermaine and probably admissible -- germaine and probably admissible and go paragraph by paragraph but without going through it orally which is what we'll have to do without a written statement. chairperson hur: other views from the commissioners? mr. attorney, i can can certainly appreciate your concern. my concern with written objections with respect to ms. madison is that mr. kopp is prepared to tell us what the objections are. i think there are legal issues with respect to what relevant testimony can come in with this declaration that i think are going to be informative about a number of issues. so in light of that, i would still propose that we go through it. i would ask that if there's a

stipulation on a paragraph not that shouldn't be admitted that it just be stated and that we don't have a rezztation of what the paragraph is about. if this becomes overly prejudicial then i think we can reconsider. i think we can get the parts of this declaration that are actually going to be at issue hopefully quickly. is that acceptable to the commission? >> yes. >> mr. kopp? >> can i just voice a concern that i had because i had the same concern that mr. renne just voice which is i did not want to have the sentences read out. my concern is that when mr. keith responds to my objections he's probably, i would think he would want to explain to you why they are relevant and that would

necessitate that recitation of these facts. i'm not so sure this is going work. i'm throg give it a try. i'm going to make my objections in the most legal and general terms without addressing this specifics. chairperson hur: ok. let's try it. >> so we don't object to paragraphs one, two, three, four and that's as far as i got. we object to paragraph five on relevance grounds. chairperson hur: any other basis? >> the first sentence is probably more prejudicial under 352. when i say relevance grounds i don't know if you want me to spell out the parts specifically that i think are more prejudicial than probative. >> i can actually short circuit this.

well, let me say specifically, paragraph five -- oh, i'm sorry. >> ok. >> paragraph five, lines 9-10, i think we would agree that the part of the sentence beginning with -- including is not relevant. >> is that sufficient to address the objection to the first sentence of paragraph five? >> yes. >> ok. >> and then mr. kopp do you have any further objection to paragraph five? >> relevance as to the rest of it. >> keith? >> i would say that we would defeat the claim of bias that's being made against ms. madison and mr. burton the