life, he took photos that helped confirm police work, identifying the two assailants in this case. as i said, we expect we will be able to use the photo he took, his last photo as evidence in this case when it goes to trial. >> thank you district attorney boudin. at this time, we will continue with mayor breed for questions. mayor breed, this question comes from dan simon of cnn. there is a real perception that quality of life has gone way down. people are fleeing the city. what can you do to help restore confidence that san francisco is not going down the drain? >> let me start by asking is there any other major city in this country that doesn't deal with similar challenges like we do in san francisco? there may not be a more beautiful city than san francisco, but the fact is that we are a major city and we have

challenges like any other major city. we know that this pandemic has caused a lot of people to realize that they may not, since they're working from home, they may not necessarily need to be in the city, especially because most people choose to live in a city like san francisco because of the restaurants and the night life and the entertainment and the things to do and those things don't exist right now because of the pandemic. i have faith. i have confidence that despite the challenges that exists in our city and other major cities in the country, that when we begin to reopen, that more people will return to san francisco. it's not a matter of if, but when. the fact is, when you look at what happened in this pandemic, san francisco, the second most dense city in the country with the lowest death rate of any major city in the country, how we handled this virus has been a

national model for the rest of the country to follow and how we will continue to address the challenges that persist in our city. it's something that we will work on. we will build more housing. we will keep our residents safe. we will put forth innovative plans and projects to address homelessness and the challenges we face together. i'm confident that people will begin to not only return to san francisco to visit as tourists for conventions and other things, which they sew -- so frequently do because they feel safe to be here in light of what happened with covid, that they will return their businesses and other things that have existed before. people will want to go back to cities and san francisco will be at the top of the list. >> thank you mayor. at this point, we will continue with questions with chief scott.

chief scott, your first question come from the s.f. chronicles. is there any indication that suggestions that the death of vicha ratanapakdee was a hate crime? >> not at this point, but the investigation is still ongoing. there is nothing at this point to indicate that it was a hate crime. we have still some investigative steps to take. we're not ruling out anything, but at this point, no. >> thank you. the next question comes from sing tow daily. after a series of violent crimes targeting the aapi elderlies in the last year, what plans does our city have to protect the elderly and prevent similar incidents from happening again and again? what will the city to make sure

that our elderlies do not live in fear? >> well, first and foremost, we have to hold people accountable. there have been a number of crimes against elderly members of the aapi community. a large of -- amount of those cases, people have been held accountable for the harm they caused. that is the first thing. even before that, we will do everything in our power to try to prevent these crimes from happening in the i.r.s. if -- first place. we spent a lot of time analyzing crimes, analyzing trends, deploying our officers, our specialized units where we think we can make the biggest difference in preventing these crimes. our high traffic corridors, chinatown or north beach, where you have a lot of tourist activity. we see a lot of those opportunistic crimes.

we have to deploy and the public has to see us out there. people feel safer in general when they see police out and visible. it's sometimes challenging. we also have to respond to our radio calls and our calls for service, but we have to do that. i know our mayor has been extremely supportive on that. we continue to get that support and we have to put our officers where they have the best bang for their buck. the third thing, working with the community members that are impacted by these types of crimes. you know, we invested a lot of time and effort in that as well. trust is a big deal. people have to feel they can trust their police department. that's why we are so, so intent on making sure that people understand that it's not about your immigration status from it's not about where you come from. if you have a problem or if you want to work with us, work with us. we're here for you.

that community outreach is really, really important to building community trust and i think we've done that. we will continue to do more of that. the mayor mentioned our community liaison unit that with her leadership, we were able to stand up in october. you know, part of this process, particularly after people had been victimized is we felt that we can provide better service to families. the district attorney mentioned, you know, they have their victims services unit but in between the time the case gets prosecuted and we're investigating, we felt we can do more on our end. that's what the community liaison unit is all about. it's about reaching out to families and the communities most impacted and working with those communities in a very direct and consistent way. we hope one of the byproducts, a positive byproduct of that is better trust, people reporting crime when it happens because if we don't know about it, it's

hard to do anything about it and also the more effective community partnership that builds resiliency in our city. you know, a lot of what we try to tell people when we're talking to them is don't make yourself an easy target. you know, don't do things, don't exhibit patterns like going to the bank, withdrawing large sums of money and things like that. people watch for these things and they take advantage of it. there are predators out there. we will do those types of things. there is no easier magic answer but be assured that the things i just mentioned are happening, will happen, even in a greater degree as we move forward and we're going to do everything we can to prevent people from being victimized, not only the aapi community but all communities. you know, we have issues all over our city. there is not a community or demographic that is not impacted by this issue. we serve all.

>> thank you chief. the next question comes from chris from cbs news. what steps are being taken to stop the drug traffic in the tenderloin? >> there are -- well first of all it's enforcement. there is quite a bit of enforcement. on a variety of levels, you know, we work with our local partners, our district attorney's office. we have our narcotics unit that works with our district station in the tenderloin, the captain and his team. we have done some specific and focused efforts with the tenderloin team. we also work with our u.s. attorneys on some of the cases that meet federal thresholds and those cases have resulted in over 150 arrests. you know, that has to be

consistently done. it has to be consistently applied. that's not going to be the answer to this issue. that has to happen, but it's not going to be the issue to this issue. the other side of that equation is how do we address the drug sales in the first place and that's the demand for drugs. we have a lot of people in need. there are a lot of hurting people that need services. it doesn't mean they're criminals, but they're addicted. we're working with our community health partners, our non-profits to help better address those issues. we all have to work together though. we can't do this work in silos. i mean there is a lot of work being done and there is the will in the city to impact this problem but we have to work together. that's one thing we're working to get better at. it's a complicated issue. there is no simple answer to this. just be assured that the arrests are happening, the enforcement

is happening, the community partnership is happening, and we just have to stay at it. >> thank you chief scott. our final question is for district attorney boudin. district attorney, the question comes from tom jensen of nbc bay area. why was the man not held accountable when a murder occurred last year? >> thank you for the question. so you're aware, there was a murder that occurred in the tenderloin area in december of 2019. that occurred before i took office. the police were investigating the case for a number of months. they did ultimately arrest four men who were believed to have been in the car that the shooter was in at the time of the murder. we filed murder charges against two men in that case and they both remain in custody pending

those murder charges today. those two men were the men we believe we can prove are the shooter and the driver. the other two men were arrested really because they were in the same time, in the same location at the same time. there was not nearly enough evidence for us to be able to file charges. we are continuing to work with the police in investigation and in prosecuting the murder charges that we have filed. it's not uncommon for arrests to occur as part of the investigative process and those areas cannot always result in criminal charges being filed. i want to commend the san francisco police department for their work in that case. as i said, the murder itself took place before i was even in office. the police department continues to investigate the case for months and ultimately we were able to file criminal charges against the two people we can prove are responsible for the murder and we will continue to prosecute that case.

i understand those are requests as well for me to answer this question in spanish. let me do that as well for the spanish language outlets here. [speaking spanish].

>> thank you district attorney

boudin. there are no additional questions. this concludes today's press conference. thank you to mayor breed, chief scott, and district attorney boudin for your time. for future questions, please e-mail dempress@sfgov.org. thank you and have a nice day.