San Francisco May Agree to Exception to ‘Sanctuary City’ Laws to Allow Alleged Rapist’s Extradition

The City of San Francisco will decide whether to make an exception to its “sanctuary city” laws in one case, after the federal government refused to allow an accused rapist to be extradited from Canada to face trial unless local law enforcement cooperated to ensure he would not be released into the U.S.

SFGate.com reported Wednesday that a San Francisco Board of Supervisors committee “begrudgingly agreed Wednesday to relax the city’s sanctuary law for this one case.” The final decision awaits the approval of the full Board of Supervisors.

The report added:

The move … would allow the San Francisco district attorney’s office to notify the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in the event that the suspect, Ben Azaza, posts bail, gets acquitted or is let go if no probable cause is found to continue his prosecution.

Federal officials refused to allow the extradition unless San Francisco agreed to relax its sanctuary policy for this case if those circumstances are met.

Azaza, a foreign national from Tunisia, is accused of raping an unconscious, intoxicated woman he picked up while working as a rideshare driver. A no-bail warrant for his arrest was issued in June 2018, which led him to flee to Canada, where he was later arrested, officials said.

San Francisco’s “sanctuary city” laws, which discourage local authorities from assisting federal immigration law enforcement, came under a national spotlight in July 2015 after a young woman, Kate Steinle, was shot and killed on a pier by an illegal immigrant who had been convicted of several felonies and deported several times.

A local jury found the illegal alien not guilty, in what was widely perceived as a case of jury nullification, as the case had been taken up by President Donald Trump, who is unpopular in the liberal city.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. He is also the co-author of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, which is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.