SAN FRANCISCO -- Calls for reform of San Francisco's police department have risen to fever pitch after a year of sex scandals, brutality charges and controversial arrests.

A string of embarrassing incidents was capped when a pair of rifle-wielding officers seized a classroom of fifth graders for use as an observation platform during a staged hostage situation.


Angered members of the San Francisco County Board of Supervisors called for Mayor Dianne Feinstein to fire Con Murphy, the department's embattled chief.

But after a meeting with top police officials last week, Feinstein vowed her continued support for the chief and announced measures to reform the department.

'I happen to believe that this chief is the best the San Francisco Police Department has produced,' Feinstein told United Press International. 'The problem is that we have a very young department. There are people coming into the department that shouldn't.

'I can never remember a time where there was narcotics dealing in the San Francisco Police Department, and now we've had incidents of that,' Feinstein said. 'That indicates to me there are the proverbial bad apples coming into this department.'

The announcement of reforms in department supervision of patrolman came at the end of a year of embarrassments that rocked the department and weakened confidence in Murphy.

'The most serious thing was the large number of officers accused of misconduct,' Police Commissioner Al Nelder said. 'It just amazes those of us on the police commission how these people can treat the job so lightly.'

Murphy responded, 'I think it's unfortunate that the phrase that keeps coming up is that the department is out of control. The department is not out of control. In every case that's come down the road since April 25 of last year, the department has taken appropriate action.'

The scandalous year began with a report of a wild sex party in a downtown restaurant during which training officers hired a prostitute to perform a sex act on a rookie officer tied to a chair.

Five officers were fired after an extensive Police Commission inquiry.

That was followed by a raid at a bar in which police burst into the building and forced patrons to lie face down while officers searched for drugs.

Several officers were reprimanded because of the raid.

The department came under fire last month after about a dozen vice officers arrested pornography star Marilyn Chambers during a performance, but no charges were ever filed.

In a related incident, San Francisco Chronicle columnist Warren Hinckle, who lambasted the department over the Chambers arrest, was seized by a pair of officers because of an outstanding traffic warrant and an unpaid citation for walking his basset hound without a leash. He paid the fines and was released.

The rocky twelve months were peppered with the arrests of patrolmen suspected of dealing cocaine and the conviction of an officer for the false imprisonment and beating of a homosexual man.

The officer was accused of screaming 'Die faggot' as he beat the man.

When an account of the elementary school exercise was made public, several members of the Board of Supervisors called for Murphy's removal.

'If you took the incidents individually, they might not appear serious,' Supervisor Willie Kennedy said. 'But a series of things have happened, and who else do you blame but the top man and his captains and lieutenants.'

'What would I do to reform the department?' Kennedy asked rhetorically. 'Eliminate from the top.'

But because the supervisors control only the size of the department's budget, direct control of the police is in the hands of Feinstein, described by some critics as a police fan.

The mayor said she listens to police scanners at home and frequently patrols the streets with Murphy.

'The mayor is what's wrong with the police department,' Supervisor Richard Hongisto said. 'Every time something goes wrong or there's another fiasco, she shows up to defend her men in blue.

'Between the mayor, the police commission and the chief, it's like the three monkeys: See no evil, speak no evil, hear no evil.'

Supervisor Harry Britt said, 'We are fighting without power. The only thing we have going for us right now is the extraordinary desire by the public to make some changes.'