San Francisco ‘Army’ gang member, again found with a gun, wins pretrial release appeal

February 15, 2024

A San Francisco gang member with a long record of violence and firearms possession, and facing another gun charge, secured pretrial release today after winning an appeal against a detention order.

Maurice Powell Jr. was arrested in possession of a 9mm handgun in June 2023 in Potrero Hill. At the time of his arrest he was on supervised release following an earlier firearms possession conviction.

He was indicted for ‘being a felon in possession of a firearm’ and charged with a probation violation.

He was denied pre-trial release by a magistrate judge at a hearing on December 4 2023, having asked to be referred to an inpatient drug rehabilitation program. He exercised his right to appeal that ruling to a district judge and appeared before Judge William Orrick this afternoon.

Prosecutors told the court that Powell, 32, is a danger to public safety. He is perhaps best known for shooting a woman in the face in a 2015 ‘drive-by’ shooting, while on post-release community supervision, for which he received a 7-year sentence. He has also committed strong arm robbery, home invasion burglary, assault, and numerous firearms offenses.

“I’m leaning toward giving you the shot,” Judge Orrick told the defendant. “I want you to understand that if I’m wrong. and if you walk away from this program, if you don’t succeed in that program, when you came back – and you would come back as you would be found – you would be facing the most severe consequences.”

SFPD officers executed a ‘probation search’ of Powell as he was leaving a barber shop on Potrero Avenue in June 2023. The search turned up a loaded 9mm Smith & Wesson pistol in his waistband.

Prosecutors noted that this was the second time that Powell had been found in possession of guns while he was on supervised release following a previous conviction.

At an earlier hearing U.S. Magistrate Judge Alex Tse had refused Powell’s request to release him from custody to a residential drug treatment facility. The judge found that he had failed to establish “by clear and convincing evidence” that he would not be a danger to the community if set free.

Powell, exercising his right to appeal, asked U.S. District Judge William Orrick to look again at his case for release. His attorney told the court that Powell had not previously had the opportunity to take part in an in-person drug rehabilitation program, nor had he the chance to receive intensive mental health treatment. She pointed to Powell’s previous success in a halfway house environment and observed that much of her client’s brushes with the law were related to his narcotics addiction.

“The nightmare scenario for the Government is for Mr Powell to be out there and for what happened in 2015 – Mr Powell shot someone in the face – to happen again,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Lagrama said this afternoon in support of his opposition to the appeal.

He noted in a written submission that Powell’s record included robbery at gunpoint (2011), break in and theft from a home (2013), carjacking (2014), shooting a woman in the face while she was in a vehicle (2015 but 2019 conviction), possession of a firearm (2019) and cocaine use.

Powell Jr. had proposed his father, Maurice Powell Sr., be a custodian. Lagrama pointed out that Powell Sr. was sentenced to six years in prison for assault with a firearm in 1991 and, subsequently was convicted of narcotics offenses and burglary.

Powell will next appear on April 25 via Zoom for an update on his progress in the drug rehabilitation placement.