Feinstein Names Chief for Troubled S.F. Police Dept.

Mayor Dianne Feinstein on Tuesday named Capt. Frank Jordan, a 28-year police veteran, to head the city’s 1,800-member Police Department, which has been troubled in the last two years by scandal and controversy.

Jordan, 50, will replace Cornelius Murphy, who resigned after five years as police chief.

The city’s Police Commission is scheduled to formally accept Murphy’s resignation and confirm Jordan’s appointment to the $88,000-a-year job at its Jan. 16 meeting.

Jordan, described as a polite but tough administrator, has drawn criticism as an “empty-holster cop” long on desk experience but short on street know-how.

But Feinstein said that when she confronted Jordan with that concern at an interview, he replied: “Better an empty holster than an empty head.”

A graduate of the University of San Francisco, Jordan’s most recent job has been director of police operations for the northwest part of the city. Past assignments include stints as administrative assistant to the last five chiefs and commander of the Community Services Division.

The force has weathered several scandals in the last two years.

On April 26, 1984, at a party for recent police academy graduates, a rookie officer was handcuffed to a chair while a prostitute performed oral sex on him. Murphy ordered 34 of the graduates to attend a refresher course on laws, rules and ethics in the department. Five officers were fired and two were suspended after a department investigation.

Other incidents included a controversial arrest of pornographic film star Marilyn Chambers, the arrest of columnist and police critic Warren Hinkle for outstanding warrants concerning his dog, and a vice raid on a bar crowded with young attorneys that turned up no evidence of criminal activity but generated lawsuits against the city by patrons who said they were held at gunpoint.