Man arrested for 2002 gang murder and witness slayings after remarkable investigation
A gang member accused of a 2019 lying-in-wait murder had killed at least three other men in San Francisco nearly two decades previously, a court has been told.
Sauntek Harris is accused of fatally shooting Perry Bradstreet in January 2002 and then murdering two witnesses to the crime – Lorenzo Richards and Gerald White — in its aftermath. He is also accused of murdering Dietrich Whitley in August 2019.
Fellow gang member Shaun Britton is also charged with Bradstreet’s murder
Police believe Harris killed Richards and White because they witnessed Bradstreet’s murder. Days before White was killed, Harris had stormed in to San Francisco’s Hall of Justice to intimidate him just before he was due to testify to a grand jury.
Superior Court Judge Eric Fleming authorized an arrest warrant on May 26 2025 and Harris was booked the following day on four counts of murder. The warrant was the result of a long-running investigation that bore new fruit after wiretaps and electronic surveillance was authorized in April this year.
On January 18 2002 Perry Michael Bradstreet died where he fell after being hit by a hail of gunfire at 1088 Palou Avenue in the city’s Bayview district. 17 spent casings, from the same gun, were found at the scene.
According to an affidavit accompanying the arrest warrant application, witnesses told police that Harris and Britton — Oakdale Mob gang members — had taken exception to others dealing cocaine in the area.
One witness, Gerald White, spoke to police on February 1 2002.
White said he had seen Sauntek Harris and another man, who police say was Shaun Britton, approach and rob Bradstreet. Harris smashed Bradstreet in the head with his gun, took the keys to his BMW and told him he would have to give him cash to get the car back. Britton then stole more of the victim’s belongings before a scuffle broke out and Bradstreet got up and ran off.
At that point, White said, the man said to be Britton fired his automatic weapon at Bradstreet as he sprinted away.
Another witness told police that Lorenzo Richards had told her that he had also seen Bradstreet’s murder. This second-hand information, police believe, gave rise to a concern among others that Richards was “snitching”.
Less than a month later Lorenzo Richards was murdered. In the small hours of February 24 2002 he was shot in the head on the doorstep of a friend’s house, also in the Bayview. Witnesses heard someone protest “I didn’t do it” and then heard a cry for help.
On July 25 2002 White arrived at San Francisco Hall of Justice in response to a grand jury subpoena. Sauntek Harris appeared outside the grand jury room in an effort to intimidate him. He told police at the Hall — who could not fathom how he had learned of the session — that he was there “to check on the witnesses.”
“Gerald White did not testify on July 25 2002,” wrote Eugene Guerrero, a homicide investigator for the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office, in the arrest warrant affidavit. “Instead he was ordered back for August 8 2002. Before he could return, however, he was murdered in cold blood, execution-style, in a very similar manner to the killing of Lorenzo Richards.”
On July 28 2002 White was shot dead in a garage of his girlfriend’s house on Sweeney Street.
It is clear from the warrant affidavit that Harris has been the prime suspect since the murders took place and SFPD have been trying to make the case against him ever since — in the face of the suspect’s taunts.
“I guess if you had any evidence I would be down at 850 [Bryant St],” he told SFPD officers executing a search warrant at his home two days after White was killed. “I guess you don’t have any witnesses. I guess you guys are pretty pissed the main witness against me turned up dead.”
“I guess if you had any evidence I would be down at 850. I guess you don’t have any witnesses. I guess you guys are pretty pissed the main witness against me turned up dead.”
Sauntek Harris to police two days after Gerald White’s killing
On August 10 2019 police say Harris killed Dietrich Whitley outside a community center on Oakdale Avenue. The victim was shot multiple times with a semi-automatic pistol. That case was ultimately dismissed in October 2024 after prosecutors told the court they would not be ready for trial.
That murder charge has now been refiled.
Prosecutors said in their affidavit that the “bulk of the additional investigation” relating to Whitley’s murder consists of wiretaps and “interception of wire and electronic communication and data”.
On April 8 2025, court documents show, a San Francisco judge authorized the first in a series of interceptions of two target telephone numbers plus one social media account.
On April 21 Britton was arrested on an unrelated charge. He was placed by police in what is described as a “staged interview room” in which were placed extensive case materials relating to the murders of Bradstreet, Richards and White. In that room, Britton refused to talk about the murders.
“Snitches get killed,” he told officers.
On April 23, the arrest warrant affidavit says, the San Francisco district attorney’s office issued investigative grand jury subpoenas to six witnesses relating to the Bradstreet murder
“The service of the grand jury subpoenas,” wrote Guerrero, “led to an immediate and drastic behavior change in Sauntek Harris.”
He said that Harris, who had hitherto predictably used the same two vehicles and used the same cell phone, swapped vehicles with others, obtained other phones and phone numbers and fled to southern California.
In a subsequent conversation with his brother he said that they needed to “get out of here” and subsequently began traveling only via train, eventually moving back north to Sacramento.
To ramp up the pressure on Harris and provoke him to incriminate himself, police issued a ‘crime bulletin’ on May 8 2025 asking for community help to solve the Bradstreet murder. This featuring pencil sketches of Harris and of Britton, who was pictured wearing the “knit mask” he was said to have on at the time of the shooting, and invited anyone who may know their identities to come forward.
In an intercepted call following its release, say police, Harris admitted involvement in the incident.
“We were kids and didn’t know no better,” he said.
Harris, 44, and Britton, 48, appeared before visiting Superior Court Judge Cecilia Castellanos on May 28 at which a ‘motion to detain’ and exhibits were filed under seal.
Neither defendant has yet entered a plea.
The pair will next appear, for arraignment, on June 6 2025.
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