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LOS ANGELES, (AP) -- Authorities say FBI agents have served search warrants at three hospitals and arrested two men in a scheme to recruit homeless people to fraudulently bill government health care programs for millions of dollars in unnecessary health services. Federal authorities say the searches Wednesday were conducted at City of Angels, Tustin Hospital and Medical Center and Metropolitan Hospital.

On July 6, SFPD Officer Lisa Frazer responded to several calls about a homeless man named George Miley, who has a long history of terrorizing neighbors at 18th and Diamond in the Castro. But when Frazer tried to serve Miley with a citation for loitering, he became obstreperous and then violent. Frazer only had time to call for backup before he charged her. "He came at me," she said. "He grabbed my microphone and severed the cord so I couldn't call. He ripped my shirt, he scratched me with his fingernails." Luckily, support arrived quickly. It took three officers to...

A long overdue civil grand jury report released Wednesday says that the city should be proud of getting over 4,000 homeless people into housing since 2004 but distressed at the scene on the streets. Panhandling, public drunkenness and street loitering are still an unpleasant reality downtown. The mayor and others are now admitting what the grand jury reported - that a majority of those on the streets are not homeless. The head of the city's homeless program, Dariush Kayhan, estimates that 50 to 75 percent of street people live in supportive housing. "We just warehouse addicts," said the grand jury's...

When a homeless man named James Allen Hill overdosed and died in the restroom of the San Francisco library last Friday afternoon, it was a shocker. A drug overdose in the public library? Really? "It was an unfortunate and tragic incident for everyone," said library spokeswoman Marcia Schneider. "Especially for the security staff that handled it." There will be those who will see Hill's death as a failure of the system, another example of how the city neglects its poorest residents. That's not the story here. The city did anything but neglect Hill. But his case does show a flaw,...

When San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom initiated a program in conjunction with Google last month to provide phone and messaging facilities to the homeless, it was the latest chapter in the city's seemingly never ending quest to tackle homelessness. While the program may prove useful for those inclined to better their situation, it is unlikely to have an impact on the chronically homeless. San Francisco has the highest per capita number of homeless in the nation, and city officials have quite a challenge on their hands. And to hear Mayor Gavin Newsom or Angela Alioto, his appointee to chair the...

Hollywood has its star Walk of Fame, but San Francisco could soon have a Walk of Shame - complete with human-shaped bronze sidewalk plaques marking where the city's homeless have died on the streets.The Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a resolution last week urging the Department of Public Works to approve a privately funded plan to install "commemorative bronze sidewalk plaques" in the districts of Supervisors Chris Daly and Ross Mirkarimi, both champions of the city's homeless.However, it doesn't seem many of the supes bothered to read the resolution before voting "yes."Mirkarimi, for example, was listed as co-sponsor - but...

Nothing characterizes the dysfunctional personality of San Francisco like its troubled relationship with panhandlers. While the city bills itself as a free-spirited tourist destination, visitors and residents regularly complain it is nearly impossible to walk down Market Street without being unpleasantly hassled. Ron Hansman, who has worked in the city on and off since 1970, says he took a visiting friend to dinner in North Beach in November and ended up in a confrontation with a belligerent panhandler in front of a Columbus Avenue restaurant. "I was thinking, what happens if we have to fight this guy?" Hansman said. "We're...

Five months ago, I wrote about the recycling center at the southeast corner of Golden Gate Park. Residents have been upset about the facility for some time. The site is noisy and ugly, and seems dated. Recycling is done at the curb of nearly every house these days, so why does the neighborhood need a special site? But most of all, the residents were upset at the fact that the homeless campers in Golden Gate Park were raiding their recycling bins at night, loading up on cans and bottles, and turning them in for cash. It was, some said, a...

It was a surprise to hear gunfire up among the upscale apartments and condominiums on Russian Hill, a shock to see a panhandler waving a knife, and an absolute stunner to hear that when police fired on the man they killed him. Everyone would agree that it was a terrible, scary, unfortunate tragedy. But there was one part of it that didn't surprise those familiar with life on the street: the announcement by police that the man had mental health problems. How many times is this going to happen? Someone living on the street, with severe mental issues, snaps and...

OAKLAND - An Oakland City Council committee will consider a proposal Tuesday to hire homeless people to clean up and remove encampments around the city. City officials are considering spending $125,000 in Redevelopment Agency and federal emergency shelter funds on the effort. About $75,000 of that would be used to pay city public works crews to clean up and fence off vacant city lots now used as encampments.

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani - who touts the cleanup of his city's chronic homeless problem as a key accomplishment in his administration - had some tough-love advice for San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom Monday, saying cities cannot encourage the impression that the homeless "have the right to live on the street." "The correct, loving, caring social policy is to engage, not ignore ... to discourage, not encourage," the GOP presidential candidate said in an interview with The Chronicle on Monday during a campaign stop in San Francisco. "We would tell them, you can't live on the street; you're...

The Berkeley City Council approved a controversial plan Tuesday night to reduce unruly behavior in public places. The new plan cracks down on yelling, littering, camping, drunkenness, smoking, urinating and sex on sidewalks and in parks. The initiative, known as the Public Commons for Everyone Initiative, will provide more housing, benefits counseling and public toilets for the hundreds of homeless people in Berkeley. It also beefs up enforcement of laws against lying on the sidewalk and imposes a smoking ban in commercial areas. Under the plan, seniors or social workers would walk around monitoring street behavior and either direct homeless...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- In a Nov. 7 story about homeless veterans, The Associated Press, relying on figures from the National Alliance to End Homelessness, gave an incorrect estimate of 495,400 veterans who were homeless at some point during 2006. Lowering its estimate, the alliance now says that 336,627 . . .

Three weeks after she was beaten bloody by a homeless man in Justin Herman Plaza, San Francisco Police Sgt. Paget Mitchell is up and about, although using a cane for a knee that may need surgery. The two men who rushed in to pull the attacker off her, software salesman Bill Mutch and bicyclist Michael Waring, were accepting awards Wednesday afternoon from the San Francisco Police Officers Association for stepping up and helping when others stood by. Richard Jaworski, the "Sign Guy" who is accused of attacking Mitchell, is in jail, facing two felony counts for assault. Mitchell says her...

A veteran San Francisco police officer is under departmental investigation - and could be suspended - for writing a letter to The Chronicle criticizing the way Mayor Gavin Newsom and the Police Department are handling the homeless problem in Golden Gate Park. According to police sources, Sgt. John Lewis of Park Station is being investigated for authoring a letter that "undermines the efficiency of the department." Lewis' letter, published on The Chronicle's editorial page Aug. 15, questioned the Newsom administration's tactic of sending cops and outreach workers into the park before dawn to steer campers into social programs or, if...

Homeless advocates and the city's leaders need to stop yelling at each other and work toward a solution -- One suggestion to address the chronic inappropriate street behavior in downtown San Francisco is a "sit-lie" law. Versions of such an ordinance are in effect in places like Philadelphia and Portland, Ore. They make it illegal for loiterers to stake out a spot on the sidewalk in front of a business and camp out there for the day.But mention it, and the reaction is immediate and polarizing. Homeless advocates insist that such laws criminalize the homeless. Angry, fed-up residents counter that...

San Francisco - the liberal, left-coast city conservatives love to mock - could be undergoing a transformation when it comes to homeless people. Although the city would still be a poor choice for a pep rally for the war in Iraq, indications are that residents have had it with aggressive panhandlers, street squatters and drug users. "Maybe there has been an epiphany," says David Latterman, president of Fall Line Analytics, a local market research firm. "People have realized they can hate George Bush but still not want people crapping in their doorway." Consider the case of David Kiely, who has...

Denver -- Three years after the launch of the most aggressive nationwide strategy in a generation to solve homelessness, there is evidence that it may be working: The number of street people in cities across the United States has plummeted for the first time since the 1980s. The drop-off reflected in street counts of the homeless taken over the past year has ranged from 30 percent in Miami and 28 percent in Dallas to 20 percent in Portland, Ore., and 13 percent in New York. In all, 30 jurisdictions reported declines in their homeless populations, including the 28 percent dip...

A bureaucratic stalemate is turning San Francisco's underpasses near the Bay Bridge into a free-fly zone for the homeless -- with the city's cops being ordered to stay out or face possible discipline charges. In recent months, squatters have been setting up camps amid the piles of beams and pillars stored under roadways for the retrofit of the bridge and its freeway approaches. In the meantime, police say, there has been a proliferation of auto break-ins and petty crimes around the freeway -- plus a growing chorus of complaints from neighbors and merchants who have had to put up with...

Ronnie "Doc" Sutro got tired of listening to cops and counselors tell him every few hours to stop panhandling in downtown San Francisco. Sign up for housing, they said. Get drug rehab. So he moved -- 4 miles west, to the woods of Forest Hill. There, he joined up with a half-dozen other homeless people who had left downtown, and together they created a hobbit-like village hidden amid thick trees. "Didn't want to hear the nagging," Sutro, 36, said with a shudder, recalling his exasperation. "Been homeless for six years. Not ready to change." Sutro is one of new breed...

A man suspected of critically wounding a San Francisco homeless assistance center employee is in police custody this morning. The suspect, a former employee of Conrad House Community Services who was terminated in September, allegedly entered the center at 154 Ninth St. around 9 a.m. and shot an employee in the chest and back. The suspect, who was allegedly armed with an ax, a handgun and a shotgun, was wrestled to the ground by two homeless men and another employee of the center, according to police spokesman Neville Gittens.

SAN FRANCISCO: 'What in the world are you ladies doing here?' Rick Jones was hunting at 9:45 p.m. Tuesday for the half-empty Coke can he left somewhere among the soggy blankets in his shopping cart when he suddenly froze. There, walking toward him on Golden Gate Avenue, was the strangest thing he'd seen in a long time at this hour, a time when the heart of the Tenderloin is generally ruled by drug dealers, their desperate customers, or other homeless people like himself. It was three gentle-looking women, one young and two middle-aged. They were strolling like it was broad...