Sanctuary City Sheriff Loses Re-election Bid

A San Francisco sheriff caught up in a national debate on immigration reform has lost his bid for re-election by a wide-margin.

Partial returns from Tuesday's vote show Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi losing to retired sheriff's official Vicki Hennessy. She has the backing of Mayor Ed Lee and the deputies association.

With more than 90,000 votes counted, Hennessy had 62 percent compared to just 31 percent for Mirkarimi.

The San Francisco sheriff's office has been in the spotlight since a Mexican national in the country illegally was charged in the fatal shooting of a San Francisco woman this summer.
Mexican illegal immigrant Francisco Sanchez allegedly shot and killed 32-year-old Kate Steinle on San Francisco's waterfront July 1; Sanchez had been released from Mirkarimi's jail in March even though federal immigration officials had requested he be detained.

Mirkarimi vigorously defended the city's sanctuary policies, which generally prohibit law enforcement from cooperating with immigration officials.

He has had other high-profile scandals plague his department.

• His driver's license was briefly suspended for failing to properly report a minor accident while driving a department-issued car,
• He flunked a marksmanship test.
• A drug gang leader escaped from jail, and guards were accused of staging and gambling on inmate fights.
• In November 2014, his department bungled the search for a San Francisco General Hospital patient whose body was found in a stairwell weeks after she wandered from her room. His office was responsible for hospital security but no one searched the building until nine days after the patient's disappearance. He apologized, but the city still paid the patient's family $3 million to settle a lawsuit.

San Francisco declared itself a sanctuary city in 1989, and under Mirkarimi largely ignored federal requests. His rival, Hennessy, has said there are cases when federal immigration officials must be notified when an inmate is about to be released.
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