- Daniel Cauich stabbed a 94-year-old man on the street in broad daylight in June 2021
- The senseless attack was caught on camera and sent shockwaves through San Francisco during a period of increasing attacks on Asian Americans
- Cauich was sentenced Friday to five years of probation and a supervision program in San Francisco Superior Court
A San Francisco man who stabbed a 94-year-old on the street has avoided jail after being sentenced to probation and a “behavioral and mental health treatment program.”
Daniel Cauich stabbed Chinese and Vietnamese immigrant Anh “Peng” Taylor multiple times in San Francisco’s Lower Nob Hill neighborhood in broad daylight in June 2021.
The senseless attack was caught on camera and sent shockwaves through the city during a period of increasing attacks on Asian Americans.
Cauich was sentenced Friday to five years of probation and a supervision program in San Francisco Superior Court.
“I’m giving you one last chance to stay out of state prison,” Judge Kay Tsenin told Cauich during the hearing, which combined another burglary charge in a separate incident.
Daniel Cauich stabbed a 94-year-old man on the street in broad daylight in June 2021
The senseless attack was caught on camera and sent shockwaves through the city during a period of increasing attacks on Asian Americans
Cauich has been entered into the state’s Intensive Supervision Court program, designed for high-risk probationers, as an alternative to state prison.
As part of the program, he will receive intensive supervision in an institution with limited freedom until the course is completed.
His attorney Lisa DewBerry successfully argued that her client had underlying mental health issues and trauma that contributed to the attack.
“When we were able to reach him to tell him what he had done, the man was crying,” DewBerry said. The San Francisco Standard.
“He couldn’t believe he had done something like that to her.”
Cauich was run over by a car and homeless at the time of the stabbing, DewBerry alleged.
Court records, including a neuropsychology report, show Cauich suffered trauma and brain injuries, which led to mental health problems and a substance use disorder.
Assistant District Attorney Phoebe Maffei opposed the sentence, arguing that Cauich is a danger to the community and should serve 12 years in prison for the stabbing.
Chinese and Vietnamese immigrant Anh “Peng” Taylor was stabbed multiple times in San Francisco’s Lower Nob Hill neighborhood
Taylor’s attacker was sentenced to five years of probation and a supervision program in San Francisco Superior Court
Taylor survived the attack and is doing well at age 97, her family confirmed
“(The stabbing) was senseless and gruesome and signals a rapid willingness to harm vulnerable people within our community,” Maffei wrote in a document protesting the verdict.
Taylor survived the attack and is doing well at age 97, her family confirmed.
“After the attack we transferred her to a residential care centre,” her daughter Vivianne Taylor told the Standard.
Adding: ‘She has recovered well and is doing fine now.’