A court hearing in a lawsuit alleging that the San Francisco Police Department illegally spied on protesters in Union Square comes as Mayor London Breed and a number of city supervisors spar on whether to expand the use of surveillance technology.
Judge Richard Ulmer of San Francisco County Superior Court heard a virtual hearing in the case of Williams v. San Francisco January 21.
In the case, lawyers from the American Civil Liberties Union allege that police conducted mass surveillance on the Black Lives Matter protests that erupted in late spring 2020 by commandeering private security cameras in the Union Square area.