XPost: talk.politics.drugs, talk.politics.guns, alt.politics.homosexuality   
   XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, sac.politics   
   From: democrat-criminals@mail.house.gov   
      
   Carrying a 12-pack of toilet paper under his arm, an adolescent boy yelled   
   as he hopped through a crowd of people smoking fentanyl and selling stolen   
   goods after dark near the corner of Seventh and Market streets in the   
   Tenderloin.   
      
   “It’s popping out here,” he exclaimed in a squeaky voice, plopping the   
   rolls of toilet paper on the sidewalk for sale. Though the boy stood no   
   more than 5 feet tall, nobody in the crowd seemed to question what a   
   middle-school-age child was doing alone at night in San Francisco’s most   
   troubled neighborhood.   
      
   This corner of Market Street, opposite United Nations Plaza, has long been   
   the epicenter of San Francisco’s drug and homelessness crises. Hundreds of   
   people have overdosed within a few block radius of this spot over the past   
   five years, more than anywhere else in the city. Since last June, police   
   have made over 2,300 drug-related arrests in the surrounding neighborhood.   
      
   But little has been said about the existence of children as young as 13   
   years old among the dealers and street vendors. Their presence in the   
   plaza is an open secret among city officials, nonprofit workers and   
   inhabitants of the area, according to The Standard’s own on-the-ground   
   reporting.   
      
   Some kids are brought to the Tenderloin after dark by their parents, who   
   are buying or selling stolen goods. Others are going at it alone—hawking   
   everything from makeup to toilet paper, which is often stolen—or even   
   dealing drugs.   
      
   Data from the San Francisco Juvenile Probation Department shows police   
   arrested 57 youths between the ages of 13 and 17 on suspicion of dealing   
   drugs between August 2023 and Feb. 8. The department said that 55 of the   
   57 teens came from outside of the city.   
      
   The department declined to provide further data on these children’s cities   
   of origin, their ages, demographic backgrounds or the locations of their   
   arrests. Court records about cases involving juveniles are not normally   
   available to the public, and requests to view redacted copies were denied.   
      
   But anecdotally, nonprofit workers and city employees said they’ve seen an   
   uptick in young people dealing drugs and stolen goods in the Tenderloin   
   since the pandemic began in 2020.   
      
   “Sometimes you see groups of kids,” said Cheryl Thornton, an urban health   
   worker who mentors youth in the Bayview and Potrero Hill neighborhoods. “I   
   see them all around the Tenderloin.”   
      
   The Public Defender’s Office said many juveniles arrested in the city are   
   victims of human trafficking, extreme poverty, abandonment and violence.   
      
   San Francisco’s chief juvenile probation officer, Katy Miller, said most   
   youth accused of selling drugs are immigrants from Central America who   
   arrived in the U.S. without their parents.   
      
   “They’re just young Black kids and young Hispanic kids,” Thornton said.   
   “So nobody really cares.”   
      
   ‘In Frisco, you gotta make it somehow’   
   One 17-year-old, who was selling stolen jars of honey in U.N. Plaza last   
   month, said he moved to the city from Fresno. He refused to give his name   
   but said he started hustling on the streets after he met a group of other   
   teens who frequented the plaza.   
      
   “It’s poverty,” he said, explaining why he works at the illegal market.   
   “It’s classism. The mother of all isms.”   
      
   “In Frisco, you gotta make it somehow,” said an 18-year-old vendor, who   
   also spoke on condition of anonymity and said he had been selling stolen   
   goods in the plaza for roughly two years.   
      
   “I told myself I would stop when I turned 18,” he said, explaining he   
   became involved in the market because it was something his friends did. He   
   said he thought he could land a legitimate job when he came of age, but   
   said he’s only managed to find casual shifts as a roofer.   
      
   A few blocks away, a 16-year-old boy from Honduras was selling fentanyl   
   and methamphetamine on Eddy Street. He told The Standard he arrived in the   
   city alone two years ago but refused to give many details about what led   
   him to deal drugs.   
      
   A woman who identified herself only as Star, who said she is paid to keep   
   dealers company and help them sell drugs, told The Standard that teens   
   like the Honduran boy would rather not be on the corner.   
      
   “They’d rather be back home with their parents,” she said. “They don’t   
   want to be out here.”   
      
   The boy later said he didn’t like selling drugs but believed his options   
   were limited. He said he came from a small ranch town in the middle of   
   Honduras two years ago but didn’t disclose what prompted his move to the   
   Bay Area.   
      
   “I’m just out here so I can make a living,” he said. “The streets are   
   tough for people like us.”   
      
   The boy and other dealers were eating baleadas—a Honduran dish consisting   
   of a flour tortilla filled with refried beans and egg—when a man   
   approached with an offer of Nike sneakers on sale for $50. The group took   
   a look at the merchandise and decided to pass.   
      
   "They're too big," the boy said of the size 10.5 shoes. "These could fit a   
   giant's foot."   
      
   Children arrested in San Francisco   
   At the end of December, a total of 418 youth were under the supervision of   
   the Juvenile Probation Department—the most since October 2020. Sixty   
   youths had active warrants for their arrest on Dec. 31, while another 24   
   were in custody.   
      
   Young people from outside of San Francisco accounted for 36% of all   
   juveniles arrested in the city, and Bayview-Hunters Point was the   
   neighborhood of origin for 15% of the department’s total cases as of Dec.   
   31.   
      
   Forty-eight of the department’s cases are under the age of 15, according   
   to data from December.   
      
   Although the juvenile probation department said many of the youths   
   arrested for selling drugs in the city were born outside the United   
   States, vendors said many children and teens selling stolen items in U.N.   
   Plaza grew up in the Bay Area or elsewhere in California.   
      
   However, data on this group is scant because the Department of Public   
   Works, which enforces rules against illegal street vending, usually   
   doesn’t track the ages of people it cites.   
      
   City Hall staffers have offered little detail on the issue of juveniles   
   and illegal vending and drug dealing. The Standard attempted to interview   
   an outreach worker with intimate knowledge about the children and teens   
   working illicit jobs in and around U.N. Plaza, but the interview request   
   was denied by the Department of Public Health. The department did not   
   provide a reason for declining the request.   
      
   Joi Jackson-Morgan, executive director of the 3rd Street Youth Center &   
   Clinic and a native of the Bayview neighborhood, said kids from her   
   neighborhood have historically gathered in the city’s downtown. But she   
   said because entry-level retail jobs have all but disappeared, more youth   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)