Who leaked the details of Jeff Adachi’s death? The policeman told how he became a suspect

Years after the San Francisco police illegally searched a reporter’s home to find out who released the death report of public defender Jeff Adachi, an officer poses as the alleged source of the leak.

Officer Douglas Tennenbaum reveals in a new lawsuit that police monitors thought he provided freelance journalist Brian Carmody with an inside account of Adachi’s death. An autopsy later revealed that he died of heart failure caused by cocaine and alcohol at the Telegraph Hill apartment in February 2019.

The leaked report contained obscene details of Adachi’s death, raising suspicion that it was circulated in retaliation for the late public defender’s persistent criticism of the San Francisco police.

Under pressure from the mayor’s office to reveal the source, the SFPD went so far as to put a battering ram on Carmody’s front door and conducted several searches that violated California’s law on the protection of journalists.

A cascading series of events brought national disgrace to the department.

Tennenbaum said the city’s watchdog agency, the Department of Police Accountability (DPA), blamed him for the leak and tried to punish him. He claims that the DPA wrongly based its investigation of him on evidence of illegal searches.

Tennenbaum, who joined the SFPD in 2005, was moved from motorcycle patrol to the department’s stables in August 2020 when police chief Bill Scott stripped him of his badge and pistol. The department’s horse stables are one of the undesirable places where the SFPD hides problematic officers.

“Defusing and seizing a star and ID is a very serious matter,” Tennenbaum’s lawsuit, filed by lawyer Christopher Shea, says. “For a police officer, this is the highest form of public disgrace.”

Tennenbaum remained in the stables until returning to patrol in April 2022. By then, prosecutors could no longer bring felony charges against him due to the leak, as the statute of limitations had expired.

His lawsuit states that the DPA dropped the non-criminal case against Tennenbaum within days of its filing, and SFPD investigators separately closed an internal investigation into him, citing a lack of “sufficient evidence.”

All the while, Tennenbaum claims to have been passed over for promotions. He is suing the city for the wages he would have received by working overtime as a motorcycle officer and if he had been promoted to sergeant.

Tennenbaum received the message from The Standard but was unable to comment immediately. He did not acknowledge or deny the leaked report in his lawsuit.

A spokesman for the city attorney’s office, which is expected to defend the SFPD and DPA in court, said the office is “looking into the complaint and will respond in court.”

DPA director Paul Henderson was unable to discuss the details of the case, but said, “I’m sure we did what we had to.”

The SFPD declined to comment on personnel issues and the open trial.

The lawsuit is not the only one triggered by Adachi’s death.

In 2020, a senior Chief Medical Examiner official sued former city administrator Naomi Kelly for firing him because he resisted her request to change Adachi’s autopsy report. A spokesman for Kelly at the time called the lawsuit “a complete sham”. San Francisco is willing to pay $436,000 to settle this case.