Man who died after club brawl was UCSF med student S.F. CRIME

A fourth-year medical student at UCSF died Tuesday of a brain injury he suffered in a weekend brawl at a San Francisco nightclub, authorities said. San Francisco's Entertainment Commission, after meeting with club owners, issued an order Tuesday requiring the club to improve its security procedures.

Medical school Dean Sam Hawgood said in an e-mail to the campus that Joe Olivares Hernandez, 30, had died of the injury he suffered early Sunday. A medical school spokeswoman confirmed the report.

The medical examiner's office did not identify the victim by name, but said he had been removed from life support Tuesday after his organs were harvested for donation.

Police said Hernandez died after being involved in one of two brawls early Sunday inside the sprawling Temple Nightclub on Howard Street near First Street.

Hernandez was knocked unconscious, and a 26-year-old man was injured and hospitalized, in a fight at about 1:10 a.m., police said. About 35 minutes later, three men got into another fight with two other men at the club, stabbing the victims with broken beer bottles.

The victims, ages 25 and 34, were taken to the hospital with injuries not considered life-threatening.

The suspects in both of the brawls fled, and no arrests have been made, Sgt. Michael Andraychak said. Police have not said whether the fights were related. Inspector Dave Falzon told the Entertainment Commission at its Tuesday night meeting that officers are continuing to investigate the incidents.

"We're hearing different accounts of what happened," he said.

The commission's executive director, Jocelyn Kane, said she met with the club's owner, manager and security director Monday and issued an order requiring the club to impose tighter security. The order requires the use of identification card scanners, a ban on beer served in bottles on weekends, an increase in the number of security cameras from 32 to 64 and the use of pat-down searches of patrons.

The order can be appealed to the commission, but Kane said the club owner was cooperative and suggested some of the requirements himself.

"The owner felt the size of the club tends to create a feeling of anonymity for its patrons to blend in and act, perhaps, in a way that they should not act," she said.

Hawgood, in his e-mail, said Hernandez was from Winchester (San Bernardino County), and that he earned his bachelor's degree in biochemistry from California State University San Bernardino.

"I have met with Joe's family to express the school's support," Hawgood said. "Please keep them in your thoughts and prayers."

The medical school is making counselors and faculty available to students, he said.