The man hired to help hold the SF Sheriff’s Department accountable has faced repeated recent law enforcement encounters, parole violations, and allegations of violence against women, which he consistently denies or attributes to bias, misunderstanding, or retaliation. William Palmer was appointed to the Sheriff’s Department Oversight Board in 2021 to help monitor jail conditions and hold sheriff’s deputies accountable, and he now serves as its president. As on other city boards, Palmer serves as a member with "lived experience" of the agency it is overseeing — he was imprisoned for decades for a crime he committed as a teen, and released in 2019.Since joining the oversight board, Palmer has repeatedly cycled through the same system he was appointed to oversee — at times invoking his position to avoid arrest, while consistently denying responsibility for nearly every incident, as detailed in recent investigations by the Chronicle and the Voice of San Francisco.In once incident highlighted by the Chronicle, Palmer was pulled over in the Tenderloin for driving with expired registration, and he can be seen on bodyworn camera footage introducing himself to a police officer as "President William Palmer" of the Sheriff’s Department Oversight Board, and refusing to hand over his license.Over the last several years, women have reportedly accused Palmer of assault, strangulation, stalking, intimidation, and sexual violence in multiple incidents. He has also faced allegations involving parole violations, unauthorized international travel, violent altercations, and secretly recording women on BART. Some of these cases were dismissed, while others were never fully prosecuted.But across many of the incidents, Palmer’s response tends to follow the same pattern.Repeatedly, Palmer has described accusations against him as misunderstandings, false claims, retaliation, or examples of society unfairly targeting Black men and formerly incarcerated people, according to the Voice of SF. Even when incidents involved police reports, surveillance footage, medical records, or parole write-ups, Palmer consistently denied wrongdoing or shifted blame elsewhere.In one of the most serious cases, a woman accused Palmer of assaulting and sodomizing her inside his apartment after he picked her up near the Mission District in 2023. According to court records, medical staff documented injuries consistent with strangulation and assault, while surveillance footage reportedly matched parts of her account. Prosecutors later dropped the charges after concerns emerged involving the witness’s credibility in a separate incident, though the district attorney stated the dismissal did not prove Palmer was innocent.Per the Voice of SF, Palmer publicly described the dismissal as vindication.In another incident, a former girlfriend accused Palmer of punching her while she was driving, throwing her phone out the window, taking her keys, slamming her onto concrete, and biting her ear. Palmer claimed she was actually the aggressor.Parole officers also reportedly documented violations involving unauthorized travel and other conduct issues, though several incidents resulted in little or no additional punishment.Even smaller encounters appeared to follow a similar script. During a traffic stop last year over expired registration tags, Palmer repeatedly identified himself to sheriff’s deputies as president of the oversight board while questioning why he had been stopped and suggesting he was being targeted.The Chronicle reports that the situation has led several city supervisors to call for Palmer’s resignation or removal from the board, while fellow commissioners have accused him of hostile behavior and failing to carry out his responsibilities.Supporters of Palmer’s appointment argue that formerly incarcerated people deserve representation in oversight spaces and that lived experience matters in criminal justice reform, but lived experience alone doesn’t replace accountability.“The first time he gets himself in trouble, he gets the benefit of the doubt,” said Damon Cooke, founder of the reentry nonprofit Uncuffed Project, speaking to the Chronicle. “But when a pattern emerges, when it happens multiple times, then you have to start looking at him instead of the system.”And, as Board of Supervisors President Rafael Mandelman tells the paper, regarding Palmer's fitness to serve on the oversight board, "Lived experience is one thing. Current experience is another."Image: SF.gov ...read more read less