Ex-San Francisco fire commissioner who was attacked with a metal crowbar faces charges for inciting the attack by using pepper spray — as defense attorneys claim a video shows him spraying another homeless man without provocation.
Don Carmignani, 53, was brutally attacked on April 12 and had to fight for his life after suffering a skull and jaw fracture.
He was using pepper spray on a homeless person outside his mother’s home in the Marina District when Garrett Doty, 24, reportedly hit him on the head with a crowbar.
Carmignani’s lawyers told him prosecutors could charge him with using pepper spray and inciting the viscous attack, and District Attorney Brooke Jenkins has decided not to prosecute Doty because he acted in “self-defense.”
A new video shows a man, believed by Doty’s lawyer to be Carmignani, spraying a homeless man during an unprovoked attack in November 2021.
There are eight police reports and videos of an unidentified man spraying homeless people in the area between November 2021 and January 2023, which the attorney accuses Carmignani of being involved. according to the San Francisco standard.
Don Carmignani, 53, who was attacked with a metal crowbar, could be charged with inciting the attack by using pepper spray – as lawyers claim new video shows him spraying another homeless man in November 2021 who went unprovoked
The former fire chief suffered a fractured skull and jaw in the attack and had to undergo 51 stitches after Garrett Doty, 24, allegedly hit him on the head with a crowbar.
The video shows a man, wearing a baseball cap and face mask, walking up to a person sleeping on a dark Marina sidewalk before spraying the person in the face for about five seconds.
The homeless man tries to cover his face and get up before the suspect casually walks away.
Kleigh Hathaway, the attorney representing Doty, says the man in the video appears to be Carmignani and that he used a similar aerosol can against her client before fighting back.
“The prosecutor and the police now have reason to believe that Mr. Carmignani was involved in eight separate acts of violence,” she said.
‘In all cases the victims are not housed, the victims sleep in their tents, sit on a bench and mind their own business. And in all of them, this man who is described as… who matches what Mr. Carmignani looks like.
‘Fortunately one of them [these incidents] was captured on video.
“This is exactly the same as the can he carried during the attack on my client.”
She repeated these allegations in court on Wednesday, saying charges against Doty should be dropped because he acted reasonably with knowledge of Carmignani’s alleged aggressive history during the incident earlier this month.
“I would say my client is acting in lawful self-defense,” she said.
But Carmignani’s attorney, Nick Colla, said his client is not the person in the video and has not committed previous attacks on the homeless.
He said: “Our client vehemently denies that he is the alleged person who commits these acts against the homeless.”
While Joe Alioto Veronese, a lawyer close to Carmignani, said he looked at an image of the suspect in the homeless attacks and said it wasn’t Carmignani.
He said, “It doesn’t look like Don at all. He’s a completely different man.’
Carmignani is not named in any of the police reports on the incidents, though Hathaway said a police inspector put the reports on file against Doty because they were “possibly related to this incident.”
She believes the case against her client will be officially dropped on Thursday if Carmignani does not appear in court for the postponed hearing.
Chilling footage showing Doty grabbing the crowbar from the trash and making practice swings just before the attack in April
Doty’s attorney says charges against him should be dropped because he acted reasonably with knowledge of Carmignani’s alleged aggressive history during the incident
It comes after the former fire chief claimed his lawyers informed him that District Attorney Brooke Jenkins has decided not to prosecute Doty because he acted in “self-defense.”
He said the city is “on fire” and “they are driving out all the locals and everyone who pays taxes” in response to the news.
In chilling footage from the April attack, Doty grabs the crowbar from the trash can and practices it just before the incident.
Carmignani claims three people “smoked crack cocaine” who leaned against his mother’s door the morning of the attack.
‘It is pathetic. My city is in chaos. They are driving out all the locals and everyone who pays taxes,” he told CBS News.
“Something has to change, the city is on fire and now the National Guard is coming in.
“I have just been briefed by my attorneys who are prosecuting me for having pepper spray in my defense and bringing charges against me.
“My daughter and her friends carry spray, what if it was one of them when you have animals on the street saying they are going to rape your daughter and kill your mother and you have nothing to do or help?”
Carmignani claims his lawyers informed him that District Attorney Brooke Jenkins decided not to prosecute Doty because he acted in “self-defense”
The San Francisco Police Department and the District Attorney’s Office did not respond to requests for comment from DailyMail.com.
Horrifying footage from the April incident shows Doty propping Carmignani up against the wall as he brandishes the crowbar as he tries to defend himself.
The former firefighter held up his fist in defense, but took another blow as he wiped the blood from his face.
Doty is then seen chasing Carmignani before leaving him for dead. He was in ICU for several days.
The homeless man was charged with assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated battery with grievous bodily harm, and violent assault likely to result in grievous bodily harm.
But officials then released him back onto the streets of the crime-ridden city after blaming Carmignani for the attack.