3 TENDERLOIN SLAYINGS ARE CALLED DRUG-RELATED

Poor Neighborhood Is "An Open Drug Market," Police Say

San Francisco police say three recent killings in the city's
Tenderloin are part of a wave of drug-related violence accounting for
nearly a third of the city's 31 homicides this year.

Early Wednesday, the drug violence claimed its latest victim,
identified by police as Jeffrey McLaughlin, 38, who was shot to death
in what police say was a drug dispute over money at Hyde and Turk
streets at 12:25 a.m.

Lt. John Murphy of the San Francisco police homicide detail said the
attack is believed to be drug related because a witness reported
overhearing talk that the victim owed money to a trio of men before
the shooting. Murphy said the men confronted McLaughlin on the street.

"It (the dispute) started out front of 138 Hyde (Street) and then he
(McLaughlin) got away and ran around the corner on Turk Street and
they shot him in the back of the head," Murphy said.

The slaying came as the department had already beefed up patrols and
ordered undercover narcotics enforcement in the Tenderloin this
month, in response to the violence and drug trade.

Police say two other recent killings in the Tenderloin also were drug
related. Lena Allen, 54, was the innocent victim in an April 14 gun
battle on Ellis Street between an unidentified man and Walter Simon,
32, of Richmond, police say. Simon has not been charged with the
killing. Prosecutors are awaiting ballistic analysis before deciding
whether to file charges.

At 7 p.m. the day before, April 13, 16-year-old Kelvin Mencia of
Oakland was shot outside a doughnut shop at Golden Gate Avenue and
Hyde Street and fled inside. The attack was captured on video. Police
say that incident stemmed from a drug dispute. Police have arrested
one adult, Jason Santillan, 25, of San Bruno, and several juveniles
in the case.

Both Simon and Santillan were free on probation at the time of the
killings and had been caught with guns in the months before, police say.

Murphy said many of the suspects and victims in recent shootings have
been from outside the city. "We're seeing a lot more spontaneous
violence in the drug trade -- it's obvious to us that many of the
people involved don't live here."

Murphy said the activity, which police refer to as commuter crime, is
centered in the Tenderloin, where they acknowledge narcotics are
available for purchase at all hours on the streets.

"It's an open drug market and it runs late," Murphy said of the
Tenderloin. "It's an all night market."

With 31 slayings, San Francisco's murders are up 33 percent over this
date last year. Nearly a third of the slayings, 9, are attributed to
the drug trade, according to police. Last year, police say, the city
had 13 drug related homicides, just over a sixth of the total of 85.

To counter the trend, police say, they have applied for and obtained
grants totaling more than a half-million dollars. They include a
$330,000 grant to target methamphetamine trafficking; $100,000 to
counter gun crime and street drug sales; and $117,000 for a
federal-local partnership to seek lengthy sentences for felons caught
with firearms, as a way to counter drug- and gang-related homicides.

The grants were approved last week by the Board of Supervisors.