SF fire chief's wages garnisheed - spousal support

San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White speaks to the media after a meeting with the mayor and city officials about health and legal issues surrounding the Occupy San Francisco protests. San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White speaks to the media after a meeting with the mayor and city officials about health and legal issues surrounding the Occupy San Francisco protests. Photo: David Butow, Special To The Chronicle Photo: David Butow, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 1 Caption Close SF fire chief's wages garnisheed - spousal support 1 / 1 Back to Gallery

A judge has declared San Francisco Fire Chief Joanne Hayes-White a deadbeat divorcee and ordered the city to start garnisheeing $3,300 a month from her paycheck for spousal support to her ex-husband.

Hayes-White says she stopped paying support about 14 months ago, after an incident in which her ex-hubby, Robert "Sean" White, grabbed and choked one of their sons while in a booze-fueled rage.

In December, he pleaded no contest in San Mateo County Superior Court to a misdemeanor charge of child endangerment and cruelty. He is serving his sentence on a county sheriff's work detail and living in a rehab house.

Last week, White went to San Francisco Superior Court demanding that the chief resume the spousal support she was ordered to pay when the couple divorced in 2009.

On Friday, Judge Ron Albers signed an order to start deducting the payments from her $302,000 annual salary, though it does not appear to cover the more than $40,000 in backlogged payments.

White's attorney, Bradley Kass, did not return calls for comment.

The support scuffle is the latest twist in the couple's family drama.

In 2005, White - a first cousin of the late Dan White - called 911 and accused his wife of hitting him on the head twice with a pint glass in their kitchen in San Francisco. Hayes-White denied the accusations, and he recanted.

(No charges were ever filed - something supporters of suspended Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi have pointed to in arguing that prosecutors overreached in charging him for what they see as a similar set of circumstances.)

After a long separation, the couple divorced in 2009, but shared custody of their three children until last year, when Hayes-White obtained a restraining order prohibiting him from contacting her or the two children who were still minors.

In an interview, Hayes-White said she had stopped making the spousal payments because of the growing costs she has incurred raising their children.

"This is not about being vindictive," she said. "Everything just went on pause" after last year's attack on the couple's son.

The chief also says White has not fully lived up to his end of their divorce settlement, including paying for half of the family health care costs and showing he has made a "good-faith effort" to find work.

"I have been shouldering the responsibility for the safety, health and well-being of my kids," Hayes-White said. "I love being chief, but my biggest and best job is being a mom."

Extra credit: A Berkeley teacher led a group of high school students on an "off-hours" field trip the other day - to a takeover of the UC Berkeley admissions office.

King Middle School teacher Yvette Felarca, who is also an organizer with the activist group By Any Means Necessary, led a group of about 25 demonstrators Friday, including a number of teens, to demand that UC admit more underrepresented minorities.

Most of the teens left when the cops ordered them out after about two hours, but three were arrested on suspicion of trespassing, along with nine adults - including Felarca.

All the teens were in high school, and none was in Felarca's humanities classes at King.

"I'm very proud and honored to have occupied with the black, Latino and Arab high school and college students," Felarca said. "They are fighting for themselves and their entire generation."

Berkeley Unified School District spokesman Mark Coplan said the district had no say over Felarca's actions, as they were on her own time.

Stay away: Former Alameda County Supervisor Nadia Lockyer has obtained a restraining order barring her ex-boyfriend from having contact with her, her 8-year-old son and her husband, state Treasurer Bill Lockyer.

The order was issued in Alameda County last week after her ex-lover, convicted methamphetamine user Stephen Chikhani, began peppering the Lockyers with voice mails, e-mails and text messages after being released from a South Bay drug treatment program.

The barrage came about the same time a couple of snippets of sex tapes Chikhani reportedly made - featuring Nadia Lockyer - popped up Friday on YouTube. They were quickly taken down.

Chikhani's lawyer, Adrienne Dell, clearly chagrined after having helped clear her client of assaulting Nadia Lockyer in a hotel room, said she was aware of the restraining order "but I haven't seen it."

Furious Fiesta: Drivers on the upper deck of the Bay Bridge may have noticed a series of circular tire streaks midway between San Francisco and Treasure Island - the kind laid down by someone burning doughnuts.

And that's just what they are.

The marks were made over the weekend by a Ford Fiesta being filmed for a commercial.

"We do commercials all the time," said Officer Tony Tam, spokesman for the California Highway Patrol.

As for the appropriateness of advertising a car doing doughnuts on the bridge?

"They pay," Tam said, "so we let them do whatever they want as long as it's within the permit."

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