SAN FRANCISCO
Lee Heidhues 7.26.2024
I’m Shocked. Hah Hah!!! It’s political payoffs and nepotism in San Francisco, again. Now it’s in the District Attorney’s office.
To be sure the mainstream media will give this story the obligatory 24 hour buzz and then move onto the next dance party at the Embarcadero.
San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins, who called herself a “volunteer” while earning 150K from MAGA moneybags for her role in the political lynching of her one time boss Chesa Boudin in 2022, shows herself, once again, to be nothing more than a shameful grifter.
The DA feels so smug and confident in this election year that she feels it’s acceptable to violate all ethical norms. Never mind Jenkins is the chief law enforcement officer in San Francisco.
Brooke Jenkins grift now extends to her cronies.
According to the San Francisco Standard, “Nursing professor Monifa Willis took on the $300K (chief of staff) role in March and continues to pull in a six-figure salary at UCSF.
Further Excerpts from SF Standard 7.26.2024
District Attorney Brooke Jenkins in March quietly promoted nursing professor Monifa Willis with no legal license — who is a longtime friend — to run the office as chief of staff, with an annual salary of nearly $300,000.
Willis has known Jenkins since they were on the same high school track-and-field team in Union City, according to a 2022 Mission Local story about the appointment.
The District Attorney’s Office said in a statement that the hiring of Willis as chief of staff did not present a conflict of interest for Jenkins. It said Willis was hired for her experience within and outside of the office.
Ryan Khojasteh, who is running against Jenkins for DA, said the decision to hire Willis shows bad judgment and special treatment of a friend. Ryan Khojasteh worked as an assistant DA during the Boudin administration. He was fired without cause by Jenkins. She cleaned house of Boudin staffers after being named DA by Mayor Breed following Chesa’s Recall in June 2022.
“Nepotism erodes public trust,” he wrote in an email to The Standard. “As San Franciscans, we deserve better from our District Attorney’s Office. My administration will not tolerate such abuses of office — assignments will be based on merit, experience and competence.”
DA Jenkins and Willis spent time together socially before Willis’ appointment to the Victim Services Division. According to their public Venmo accounts going back to 2021, the pair have gone to dinner, rented a car, attended a football game and visited a waxing salon together.
That relationship must be disclosed, according to city ethics rules, but was not.
Jenkins’ office said in a statement that the specific ethics rule around such disclosures does not apply to this hire.
Monifa Willis, who still earns more than $100,000 a year for her part-time work at UCSF, was initially hired in 2022 to run the District Attorney’s Office’s Victim Services Division. She was also the CEO of a marijuana dispensary called New Life CA, which is now closed.
While city ethics rules require disclosing close relationships — and bar the hiring of direct family members — the appointment raises questions about the DA’s appointment of a friend who has few of the typical qualifications for the chief-of-staff position and holds down a lucrative second job.
“She was given this position because she knew the DA,” a former Victim Services employee who worked under Willis told The Standard. The former employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of professional backlash, said Willis had little knowledge of the law around victims’ rights.
In Contra Costa County, the job requires not only a law license but 10 years of professional legal experience. San Francisco’s position does not require a license to practice law but does require four years of managerial experience in a legal, legislative or clinical social environment.
Top photo: DA Brooke Jenkins and her high school buddy Monifa Willis, the newly minted chief of staff
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