Danny Sandler, a.k.a. 'Evil Elmo’ back, winds up in slammer

Dan Sandler takes a break from posing for photos with tourist dressed as Elmo in Fisherman's Wharf on March 5th 2014. Sandlers has been known to go on various heated controversial rants while wearing the costume. less Dan Sandler takes a break from posing for photos with tourist dressed as Elmo in Fisherman's Wharf on March 5th 2014. Sandlers has been known to go on various heated controversial rants while wearing the ... more Photo: Sam Wolson / Special To The Chronicle Photo: Sam Wolson / Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 17 Caption Close Danny Sandler, a.k.a. 'Evil Elmo’ back, winds up in slammer 1 / 17 Back to Gallery

“Evil Elmo,” the screeching twin of the lovable “Sesame Street” character, is in the slammer after being accused of threatening a merchant along San Francisco’s touristy waterfront.

For years, Elmo — a.k.a. Danny or Adam Sandler — has eked out a living from Fisherman’s Wharf to New York’s Times Square, wearing a furry red costume and having his picture taken with tourists.

He has also been an unwelcome nuisance, garnering media attention for aggressive outbursts at tourists who wouldn’t pay him or mixing it up with the homeless.

His rants have kept him on the move — pingponging from Los Angeles and Honolulu to San Francisco and New York, and picking up a string of police citations en route.

Fisherman’s Wharf merchants were anything but tickled when Elmo popped up here last winter, and pretty soon, police and a quality-of-life prosecutor assigned to the neighborhood were collecting video and other evidence chronicling Elmo’s bad behavior.

A number of shop owners around Jefferson and Leavenworth streets, where Elmo hung out, posted signs in their windows making it clear he had no connection to their businesses, contrary to what he might have suggested to some tourists.

Sandler apparently got ticked off — and when he ran across a food merchant the other day, he allegedly demanded she remove the anti-Elmo sign from her window.

When she refused, according to district attorney’s spokesman Alex Bastian, Sandler let her have it with a stream of expletives and yelled, “I’m going to rip your throat out!”

The cops showed, slapped the cuffs on Elmo and arrested him for allegedly making a criminal threat. They also booked him on a series of misdemeanor counts dating back to August.

Prosecutors argued that Sandler was becoming increasingly belligerent, which, coupled with an outstanding bench warrant from New York, made him a flight risk. The judge agreed and set Sandler’s bail at $250,000. He’s still being held at County Jail pending a court date Thursday.

Elmo’s furry red suit has also been locked up — placed into evidence at the Hall of Justice.

Sandler’s court-appointed attorney, Rafael Trujillo, after briefly meeting with his client in a holding cell, told us he was still trying to make sense of the unusually high bail. “He seems like a perfectly nice gentleman,’’ Trujillo said.

Conflicted: Lawyers for the new Transbay Transit Center want prominent San Francisco attorney and ex-Police Commission President John Keker to stop representing downtown developers in their megamillion-dollar tax fight with the city, saying he has a conflict of interest.

At issue: Keker was earlier paid $950 an hour to represent the Transbay Joint Powers Authority, which is overseeing construction of the new transit center, in a separate dispute with some of the same developers. He was thus privy to “confidential information” on financial and legal matters that he could now use in the fight against the agency’s plan to tax his new clients hundreds of millions of dollars, the authority said.

Andrew Schwartz, an attorney for the authority, demanded in a Nov. 10 letter to Keker that he withdraw from representing Boston Properties or any other developer that would be affected by the tax. He also called for Keker to disclose any confidential information he got from the authority that he may have since shared with the developers.

Boston Properties and other developers are threatening to sue over their tax bill, jeopardizing both the completion of the $2 billion Transbay Transit Center at Mission and First streets and the nearly $2 billion plan to build a rail tunnel to the Caltrain station at Fourth and King streets.

Keker called the demand that he step aside “a chickens— move.”

“They should be embarrassed,” he said. “There is no conflict. This is a tactical move, which I consider a great compliment, because they’re scared to have my firm on the other side.”

The envelope, please:One big winner in last week’s election was Nicole Derse and the gang at 50+1 Strategies, who ran Supervisor David Chiu’s by-a-nose win over David Campos for state Assembly, Nick Josefowitz’s upset win over James Fang for the BART board and Malia Cohen’s re-election to the Board of Supervisors.

The 50+1 group also worked with Airbnb, organizing short-term renters to lobby the Board of Supervisors to approve Chiu’s legislation legalizing “shared” home use.

Before setting up shop on her own, Derse worked with Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign. Her first big local race was helping Ross Mirkarimi win election to the Board of Supervisors in 2004.

Mirkarimi, of course, was front and center as an issue in the Chiu-Campos race — with Chiu’s campaign putting Campos on the defensive for voting to let the sheriff keep his job after pleading guilty to a domestic-violence-related misdemeanor.

But don’t look for any conflicted feelings from Derse: “I’ve been consistent. Ross should not be sheriff,” she said.

Guess that’s one re-election campaign 50+1 won’t be running.

San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross appear Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call (415) 777-8815, or e-mail matierandross@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @matierandross