On-probation gun felon found with assault weapon after traffic stop – prosecutors
A gun felon accused of a battery of firearms charges after an assault weapon was found during a traffic stop will appear at San Francisco’s Hall of Justice today for a preliminary hearing.
Prosecutors say Claudio Maciel, 30, was a passenger in a car that was stopped by SFPD in the early hours of March 9 after concerned cops saw it blow through a red light in the city’s financial district.
“While contacting the driver, defendant, who was sitting in the back seat, tried to conceal an AR-15 style assault pistol in between his legs,” wrote assistant district attorney Rebecca Warren in a motion to detain.
At that point, she added, Maciel bolted from the car and led police on a foot chase before being captured.
The assault weapon was loaded with a high-capacity magazine.
Maciel is perhaps best known for firing two guns simultaneously during a November 2021 incident outside Pop’s Bar in San Francisco’s Mission district, which resulted in a federal firearms conviction.
He remains on post-release community supervision by probation officials.
In February 2016 Maciel was convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm after a 49-year-old man was viciously beaten in the restroom of Blondie’s Bar on Valencia Street.
That incident took place just a week before he was convicted of a robbery.
He also has a prior juvenile adjudication in San Francisco. As a consequence a city judge sent him to a school in Iowa where, in 2014, he had his photo taken with then-Governor Terry Bransted and then Lt. Governor Kim Reynolds.
Maciel, who has pleaded not guilty to seven felony and one misdemeanor firearms charges, will appear today in Department 12 of San Francisco Superior Court for a preliminary hearing.
Judge Dawn Payne earlier granted prosecutors’ motion to keep him detained pending trial.
The case continues.
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