S.F., feds liable in Kathryn Steinle killing, parents say

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The parents and brother of a woman gunned down on San Francisco’s waterfront in July, allegedly by an immigrant facing deportation, said Tuesday they were ready to go to court to force the city and federal government to take steps to prevent a repeat of the tragedy.

Jim Steinle and his wife, Liz Sullivan, of Livermore joined their son Brad Steinle on the steps of San Francisco City Hall as their attorneys announced they had filed legal claims in advance of expected lawsuits against the city and two federal agencies in the killing of Kathryn Steinle.

The 32-year-old San Francisco woman was walking with her father on Pier 14 when she was shot to death the evening of July 1. Accused of her murder is Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, 45 — a Mexican immigrant whom San Francisco sheriff’s officials released from jail in April despite a request by the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that he be turned over for possible deportation. The gun used to kill Steinle had been stolen four days before the shooting from a federal Bureau of Land Management agent’s car in the city.

The Steinle family said all the agencies involved were culpable in her killing. They said they have seen plenty of finger-pointing in a case that focused national attention on San Francisco’s sanctuary-city policies, but that no one has taken responsibility.

Silence ‘deafening’

Jim Steinle said his daughter took a selfie on the pier seconds before the shot rang out, then called to him for help as she lay dying. City officials sent condolence cards in the days that followed, he said, but “since then, the silence has been deafening.”

“That’s my bedtime story — every night — and if you want it to be your bedtime story every night, then do nothing,” he said. “If you feel that is wrong — and it is — be active. Let this city, this state and this country know that this can’t stand.”

Attorneys for Steinle’s family said Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi had abused his authority when he issued orders in March barring deputies from cooperating with immigration officials, under his interpretation of the sanctuary-city law. They said federal officials, in turn, knew that Mirkarimi would refuse to honor immigration holds, yet did nothing to compel him to turn over Lopez-Sanchez, a five-time deportee who had just completed a prison sentence for illegally entering the country.

The Bureau of Land Management agent left his service gun in a backpack, which was in plain view in his car’s backseat, the family said in claiming that the agency hadn’t done more to force its employees to keep their weapons secure. The entire backpack was stolen.

Keeping memory alive

“We’re here not only for Kate, to keep her memory alive, but to have something done” by government officials, Jim Steinle said. “As of this moment, as of this day, that hasn’t happened.”

Brad Steinle said the family went to Washington to speak with members of Congress shortly after the slaying, but that since then, the city has done “absolutely nothing to protect this from happening to another person.”

The failure to make changes, he said, “says to me that what was done to Kate was OK, that she was collateral damage, that she didn’t matter.”

The family’s claims do not specify any monetary damages. Governments routinely deny such claims, which are usually precursors to lawsuits.

“No amount of money will ever bring Kate back, but I hope that us standing here today, making a statement, will start the process of change so people will feel safe when they come to this city,” Brad Steinle said.

Matt Dorsey, a spokesman for the San Francisco city attorney’s office, said officials have 45 days to consider the claim. “It would be premature for us to comment about it,” he said.

A representative of Immigration and Customs Enforcement said the agency had no comment on the possible ligitation, and Bureau of Land Management officials said only that they were cooperating with the investigation.

Legal obstacle

Any lawsuit the family files against a government agency could face steep odds. The family of a father and two sons who were shot dead on a San Francisco street in 2008 tried to sue the city for failing to turn over their killer to immigration authorities after earlier juvenile offenses, but were barred from doing so.

The city wasn’t legally to blame for the crimes Edwin Ramos, suspected of being in the country illegally from El Salvador, committed after his release from custody in San Francisco, Judge Charlotte Woolard of San Francisco Superior Court ruled in 2010.

Cities “generally are not liable for failing to protect individuals against crime,” Woolard said in dismissing a damage suit by the widow and daughter of Tony Bologna, 48, who was shot to death in his car near the family’s home in the Excelsior district. His sons Michael Bologna, 20, and Matthew Bologna, 16, were also killed.

Matt Davis, the attorney for the Bologna family, said the Steinle family could run into the same obstacle as his clients.

“The court will be concerned about the arguably remote causal connection” between the killing, on the one hand, and Mirkarimi’s actions, the immigration agency’s response and the gun theft on the other, Davis said.

Frank Pitre, an attorney for Steinle’s family, said this case was different because her death was the direct result of an allegedly illegal order: the memo Mirkarimi approved in March that directed deputies not to contact Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Federal law specifies that law enforcement agents have free rein in cooperating with immigration officials, Pitre said.

“In the Bologna case, you did not have an order issued by a sheriff,” Pitre said. “That order set up Sheriff Mirkarimi as the judge and jury as to who would get reported and who wouldn’t.”

Jaxon Van Derbeken is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: jvanderbeken@sfchronicle.com