San Francisco Police Search for Missing Suspect in Alamo Square Racist Threats

More than four months after Terry Williams first received a racist, threatening package at his home in San Francisco’s Alamo Square, police have announced a suspect and are seeking the public’s assistance to find her.

April Martin Chartrand, a 67-year-old Black woman who Williams said he had one interaction with years ago, was named by police as a suspect in the hate crime investigation on Friday. Her family reported her missing two weeks earlier.

Williams, who is also Black, said Police Chief William Scott called him on Friday to let him know police had identified a suspect, but he didn’t know it was Chartrand until he looked at the release online.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Williams said. “I was like, ‘A Black person doing this?’ It was crazy to me.”

Chartrand, who, according to social media, is an artist and holds a master’s degree in counseling, in August had detailed an incident in which a woman yelled a racist comment at her on the street.

“This kind of thing is so triggering and just scary beyond anything I can say here,” she wrote on Facebook. “So, use this as a lesson to open your perceptions about the undercurrents of racism and bigotry that is pervasive in all of society and also in San Francisco.”

Williams said he first woke up to a threatening, racist package at his front door on April 26. It included a doll in blackface with a noose around its neck and racist slurs written on it, along with printouts of racist imagery. He received a similar package on May 5, this one including a doll in blackface with the words “Get out of the Alamo Square district” on its front as well as a small plastic grenade and Ku Klux Klan imagery.

Williams told KQED at the time that he felt the packages sent a message: “It’s not a Black neighborhood no more — get out of here, you don’t belong here,” he said.

In the following weeks, Williams said he was sent more messages through the mail to his address. On May 21, the home where he and his parents live was destroyed in a fire, which officials say is still listed as “under investigation.”

A family member reported Chartrand missing on Aug. 23. She describes herself on social media as a designer and researcher, and according to a profile on the networking platform Academia, she did research focused on the subculture of “women of color in the Bay Area in the fetish lifestyle” before and during her time at San Francisco State.

Williams knew Chartrand from around the neighborhood and said he recalled one interaction with her years ago when she was placing broken plates in front of her home. He said he had an issue with that since the sharp pieces could hurt neighborhood dogs.

“I’m an animal lover. I don’t want any animals getting hurt,” said Williams, who is known around Alamo Square for running a dog-walking business.

As of Monday afternoon, a police department spokesperson could not offer any updated information about Chartrand’s status.

“I can protect myself, I’m not worried about it,” Williams told KQED. But he said he did worry about his family. “My mom, ever since the fire, she’s not been the same.”