Ronald Bridgeforth - 40-year fugitive - sentenced

March 24, 2012 Michael Macor / The Chronicle

Ronald Bridgeforth, with wife Diane and sister Connie Bridgeforth in November, fled in the '60s.

In an emotional and at times tense court hearing, a 67-year-old man who spent more than four decades on the lam was sentenced Friday to a year in county jail for opening fire on South San Francisco police officers in 1968.

About 30 supporters of Ronald Stanley Bridgeforth applauded after a hearing at which Superior Court Judge Lisa Novak said she had decided against imposing the maximum five-year sentence because Bridgeforth was taking responsibility for his crime and wasn't a danger to society.

Bridgeforth pleaded no contest to assault with a deadly weapon in November, 11 days after he left his life as "Cole Jordan," a therapist at Washtenaw Community College in Ann Arbor, Mich., and turned himself in to San Mateo County authorities.
Fired at 3 officers

Bridgeforth admitted to firing on three South San Francisco police officers in November 1968 after trying to use a stolen credit card at a department store on El Camino Real.

He pleaded no contest to the crime in 1969 but fled before his sentencing. He settled down in Michigan, earned bachelor's and master's degrees, got married, had two sons and, according to his family and supporters, lived a life of service counseling college students.

"I have worked tirelessly to remake myself into someone that my family and my community could be proud of," Bridgeforth said before being sentenced in Redwood City. "Today brings me closer to that goal."
Student testifies

A former student, Zachary Baker, said he met Bridgeforth six years ago, on the day he was planning to drop out of college. He had just lost his job and was homeless.

Now he attends the University of Michigan and plans to become a social worker, he said. He tutors elementary school students in Detroit and has them add "future college student" to their names on all their work.

"Every person I help is a direct result of the influence Mr. Bridgeforth had on my life," Baker said. "Had he been in jail the day I needed help, my life would not be where it is today."

Prosecutors sought a longer sentence, saying Bridgeforth deserved it for committing a violent crime that endangered not only police but bystanders at the store.

Police Lt. George Baptista, one of the officers Bridgeforth shot at, said he had considered quitting after the incident, fearing his infant son would grow up without a father.

"I've encountered a lot of violent people, but in my experience, Mr. Bridgeforth was the most violent," he said. "He is the only one who tried to kill me."

Bridgeforth apologized to the South San Francisco officers in court Friday and called the shooting "a misguided and reckless act that endangered everyone's lives."
'Genuine' remorse

In passing sentence, Novak said Bridgeforth appeared to have "genuine" remorse and was truly rehabilitated.

She turned down the defense's proposed sentence of probation, however, saying, "Probation would not be appropriate for someone who shot at police officers."

In addition to a year in county jail, Novak sentenced Bridgeforth to three years' probation, 300 hours of community service tutoring at-risk youth and a fine of $8,500.

San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Demian Bulwa contributed to this report.

43 years later, a guilty plea to shooting at South City police

Ronald Stanley Bridgeforth

Nov. 22, 2011 By: Ari Burack | SF Examiner Staff Writer

A 67-year-old man who fled before he could be sentenced more than four decades ago for shooting at South San Francisco police finally admitted to the crime in court Tuesday morning.

Ronald Stanley Bridgeforth re-entered a guilty plea in San Mateo County Superior Court to one count of assault with a firearm on a police officer, District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe said.

Under 1969 sentencing guidelines, Bridgeforth could face between one and 15 years in prison, according to Wagstaffe. Prosecutors have not yet decided what penalty they will seek.

“In our book there is a presumption that prison is where that person belongs, but we’ll keep an open mind until we see the pre-sentence report,” Wagstaffe said.

Bridgeforth, who turned himself in two weeks ago, admitted to firing at officers outside a South San Francisco department store. He and two other men had tried to use false credit cards to buy toys and clothes for youth the group had been organizing in San Francisco’s Fillmore district during the civil rights movement, according to his attorney Paul Harris.

Harris has said his client wanted to correct a one-time “aberration” in his life and be a positive example for his sons.

No officers were hit, and Bridgeforth was arrested trying to escape. But before Bridgeforth could be sentenced in 1969, he disappeared.

According to Harris, Bridgeforth had recently been teaching at a community college in Michigan under an assumed name.

A separate charge against Bridgeforth, for his alleged involvement in the 1971 fatal shooting of a San Francisco police sergeant, was dismissed after Bridgeforth turned himself in on the South San Francisco case.

Bridgeforth is out of custody after posting $25,000 bail. Sentencing is scheduled for Feb. 3.

Ronald Bridgeforth lived under radar for decades - enters plea

Laura Rena Murray, SF Chronicle
Tuesday, November 22, 2011

For four decades, he lived an alternative life, with a name that
wasn't his own, keeping secret a criminal past. In August, the
67-year-old counselor decided it was time to surrender.

Ronald Bridgeforth and his wife slowly packed their Michigan home,
where they had lived for 35 years, giving away personal belongings
and donating a majority of their books to local libraries and
museums. They resigned from their jobs: he, a licensed therapist and
faculty member at a community college; she, a professor of English
composition and literature.

Hand in hand, they boarded a flight to the Bay Area.

Today, Bridgeforth plans to plead guilty to assault on a police
officer with a deadly weapon. Fearing a lengthy prison term, he
skipped out on bail shortly after pleading no contest to the 1968
crime. According to his attorney, Bridgeforth faces one to 15 years in prison.

He sat down with The Chronicle shortly after turning himself in to
authorities this month to describe how he created his life as Cole
Jordan, the mild-mannered Michigan college therapist, and what led
him back to the Bay Area to once again become Ronald Bridgeforth.

Bridgeforth's mother was 15 when she gave birth to him in Berkeley.
The first six years of his life were spent with his grandparents in
Arkansas, until his mother married and moved the family to the Los
Angeles area. His mother became a pharmacist; his stepfather was a mechanic.

"It was a good family," he said. "I was nurtured." Describing himself
as an "athletic nerd," Bridgeforth said he played the violin and
varsity football and "never got in any trouble."


Finding a place to fit in

After graduating in 1962, he decided to attend Sterling College, a
small Presbyterian school in Kansas where he was one of only two
black students. He attended classes there for a year and a half, but
felt isolated. He didn't fit in.

So halfway through his sophomore year, he transferred to Knoxville
College, a predominantly African American school in Tennessee. "I saw
myself in everyone around me," Bridgeforth recalled. "I wasn't an oddity."

It was there that 19-year-old Bridgeforth met a recruiter from the
Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and agreed to work the
summer of 1964 registering black voters in Mississippi.

"I did not have a real understanding of the politics of the South,"
he said. "When my mother found out, she was terrified."

That summer stretched into a full year with the committee. He dropped
out of college. During that time, he said his work led to being
threatened by mobs, vigilantes and being unfairly targeted by police officers.

"People risked their lives to vote," he said. "It wasn't safe. You
could disappear in Mississippi."

Ron Carver worked under Bridgeforth with the committee and considered
him a mentor. One day, Carver remembered, he gave his car keys to his
friend in front of a state trooper, who then arrested Bridgeforth on
a trumped-up charge of stealing Carver's car. That was the life he
led in Mississippi as a politically involved black man, said Carver,
who now lives in the Washington, D.C., area and is a consultant for
labor, environmental and human rights organizations.

"He was brave. He was a leader," Carver said. "He helped empower the
black community of Starkville, Miss."


Back to Bay Area

Bridgeforth transferred to the committee's San Francisco office after
a year in Mississippi. But once he was back in the Bay Area,
Bridgeforth drifted away from the student group. He worked part time
for the longshoremen's union. He also joined the Independent Action
Movement, a volunteer community service group that he said helped to
improve schools through literacy programs.

Then came the day that would forever change his life: Nov. 5, 1968.

Police were called to a White Front discount store on El Camino Real
in South San Francisco on a report of a customer arguing with store
employees. Bridgeforth admits he was trying to buy toys and clothing
for kids in the community with a stolen credit card.

Bridgeforth said he panicked when police arrived. According to
prosecutors, he took a handgun out of his pocket and led the store
manager and two police officers to the front of the store. He had
jumped into a waiting car with two other men when a third police
officer arrived and blocked the getaway car's path.

Authorities said Bridgeforth opened fire, hitting the car but none of
the officers, who returned fire. Bridgeforth was shot in the foot,
his getaway car crashed, and the men were arrested.

"It was incredibly reckless, stupid and dangerous," he said last
week. He called the incident "an aberration in my life."


Prison looms

At the time, he would have been subjected to indeterminate
sentencing, which stipulates a range of time served in prison as
decided by the parole board instead of the courts. Faced with the
possibility of a lengthy prison term, Bridgeforth decided to run.

"The politics of the Bay Area were really volatile," he said. "I left
because I didn't want to go to jail for the rest of my life." When
Bridgeforth jumped bail, he left behind an arrest warrant that would
haunt him for decades.

After he fled San Francisco, Bridgeforth assumed a new identity as
Cole Jordan in New York.

He acquired a fake passport and moved to Dakar, Senegal. Although he
said he didn't know anyone when he arrived, he met a group of
Americans and followed them to Gambia. Once there, Bridgeforth was
accepted into the family of a woman in her late 40s, Yai Sainabu, and
he relaxed into the indigenous culture. Bridgeforth remembers
spending most of his days reading history and philosophy books in the
local library, where he said he felt safe.

But after two years, he decided to return home.

"They treated me like family, but America is where I wanted to be,"
he explained. "The answers I sought were not there. This is my home."


Back to America

Bridgeforth returned to California in 1971, bouncing between Los
Angeles and the Bay Area. He was apprehended by police that winter
while driving in the city with an old friend. Bridgeforth declined to
say why he was arrested in that case.

Officers released him an hour later before they realized he was a
fugitive. After the close call, he moved to Atlanta, where he was
joined by a friend he would later marry. His wife, Diane, did not
want to reveal her last name, nor would Bridgeforth say what or when
she knew about his criminal past.

After saying goodbye to his mother at the pharmacy where she worked,
Bridgeforth cut off all ties with his mother and younger sister, who
had been subjected to police and FBI questioning on his whereabouts.
In order to live as Cole Jordan, he needed to leave his past behind,
he decided.

"The fact that I assumed a new identity placed restrictions on what I
could do," Bridgeforth said. "You make certain decisions and you pay
certain prices.

"It was a kind of self-imposed prison," he said. "Not being in jail
is not the same as being free."


Settling down

After getting married in Atlanta, Bridgeforth moved his family north
and settled in Michigan. He worked as a welder and custodian while
earning his bachelor's degree from Wayne State University. In 1993,
he graduated with a master's degree in counseling. In 1998, he joined
the faculty at Washtenaw Community College in Ann Arbor, Mich.

"I was better at that than anything I'd ever done," Bridgeforth said.
"I was given a chance at Washtenaw to rewrite my life, and I worked hard."

One of his former students, Kelly Mendenhall, said Bridgeforth
transformed her life when she met him in 2000. Once a depressed
college dropout, she credits Bridgeforth with motivating her to
re-enroll and said he guided her through college.

"He was at every ceremony clapping and cheering for me," she said.
"And at graduation, when I walked down the aisle with a gold honors
cord around my neck." Mendenhall is now the director of a community
center for at-risk youth in Ann Arbor.

Although he kept his past a secret while living in Georgia and
Michigan, Bridgeforth's family was involved in the community, he said.

The couple participated in school-based parent support groups and
developed after-school programs. He coached a youth basketball team
and sponsored student groups, such as the African American Men for
Education and Success and the
African American Humanities Club.

His wife earned two master's degrees, in educational psychology and
English composition, and taught at both the high school and college
levels. They raised two sons and said they worried about basketball
games, PTA meetings and summer camp.


Decision to give up

Once he decided to surrender, Bridgeforth Googled his real name for
the first time in years. He was shocked to find out that he was
listed on the FBI's Most Wanted list for the 1971 murder of a
policeman in San Francisco, a crime he says he did not commit. Sgt.
John Young was shot and killed at the Ingleside police station,
purportedly by members of the Black Liberation Army, a violent
offshoot of the Black Panther Party.

Although he acknowledges being impressed by the Black Panther Party's
rhetoric and community programming efforts at the time, Bridgeforth
maintains he was never a member of the Black Liberation Army.

The two men who were with Bridgeforth during the 1968 shooting were
arrested in 2007 for the Ingleside homicide. Charges against them
were ultimately dropped. Last week, state prosecutors announced they
would not proceed with charges against Bridgeforth in that case.

That leaves only the 1968 case.

Bridgeforth said he and Diane discussed surrendering to authorities
several times over the years. Each time, they decided against it,
saying they wanted to give their sons a normal childhood.

Now those boys are in their 30s. They never knew about their father's
past until recently, when Bridgeforth said he had to address some
legal problems in California.

"My sons didn't ever know their families," he said.

That included his sons' 81-year-old grandmother, who Bridgeforth
discovered was still alive after an Internet search turned up her
name on meeting minutes from community organizations.

"I really thought I had lost my mother, and she thought she lost me," he said.

Ronald Bridgeforth to enter plea Tuesday, Nov 22nd - 9 am - Redwood City

Ronald Bridgeforth will be entering a plea in court Tuesday, November
22nd at 9 am in front of Judge Novack. The hearing is in the Redwood
City Superior Court - second floor - 400 County Center.

More than four decades after jumping bail, a 67-year-old college
counselor walked into a Redwood City courtroom Thursday, November
10th and said he planned to accept punishment for opening fire on
South San Francisco police officers in 1968.

Ronald Stanley Bridgeforth pleaded no contest to assault with a
deadly weapon in 1969, but fled before sentencing. Bridgeforth
recently made bail, set at $25,000.

Speaking briefly during the hearing in San Mateo County Superior
Court, Bridgeforth said, "I guess I've come back to face the
consequences of my actions."

Ronald at 20 years old left college to go to Mississippi where he
registered voters for over a year, where he was chased by a mob,
threatened with death, and briefly arrested by Mississippi police
when he went to the station to pay a ticket. He went to San
Francisco where he organized for SNCC, bringing Fanie Lou Hamer to
the bay area to speak, and acting as Stokley Carmichael's bodyguard
when Stokley spoke to various colleges and organizations here in the bay area.

In the last 40 years he worked his way up from a custodian to getting
a Masters degree in Counseling. He has been a respected and beloved
counselor and teacher at a community college in Michigan for many years.

The California Attorney General's office recently dropped murder
charges against him in the killing of police Sgt. John Young at San
Francisco's Ingleside Station on Aug. 29, 1971.

Support Bail for Ronald Bridgeforth

From: "Paul Harris"

dear friends:

My name is Paul Harris, i teach "guerrilla lawyering" at two law
schools in san francisco. http://www.guerrillalaw.com

I am writing on behalf of my client Ronald Bridgeforth, who after 42
years as a fugitive surrendered in court today. We are trying to
raise the bail of ten percent of $25,000. These are the facts:
Ronald, who is 67 years old, married and has two young adult sons,
was charged with the murder of a police officer and conspiracy to
murder law enforcement. That case has been referred to as the San
Francisco 8. The Attorney General's office informed me last night
that they "were not going to proceed against him in that case and
would discharge the warrant for his arrest."

However, Ronald is guilty of a l968 charge of assualt on a police man
with a deadly weapon, when he and two others tried to leave a parking
lot after a failed attempt to use stolen credit cards to buy clothes
and toys for the kids they were working with in the Fillmore district
of S.F. A police car blocked their way and Ronald shot two bullets
into the car, and then was shot by police in the foot. He was the
only one injured. Told by his appointed attorney that he would serve
life in prison, he jumped bail. He has come back of his own accord
to plead guilty and faces, according to the district attorney, five
years to life under the l969 indeterminate sentencing law.

Ronald at 20 years old left college to go to Mississippi where he
registered voters for over a year, where he was chased by a mob,
threatened with death, and briefly arrested by Mississippi police
when he went to the station to pay a ticket. He went to S.F. where
he organized for SNCC, bringing Fanie Lou Hamer to the bay area to
speak, and acting as Stokley Carmichael's bodyguard when Stokley
spoke to various colleges and organizations here in the bay area.

In the last 40 years he worked his way up from a custodian to getting
a Masters degree in Counseling. He has been a respected and beloved
counselor and teacher at a community college in Michigan for many years.

Why did he return? Because he wanted to be a father his sons could
continue to be proud of, he wanted to be a model of the man he has
become, not the young reckless man he was on Nov. 5, l968.

Ronald is a dignified, eloquent, spiritual man. He has arthritis in
both hips, and other medical conditions which makes every day in jail
difficult. Any help you can give would be so greatly appreciated.

You may send checks made out to:

Paul Harris
20 Quickstep Lane, # 1
San Francisco, CA 94115.

With all the arrangements of surrendering him and making sure he was
not arrested in these last few days, I did not have time to set up a
nonprofit organization for bail donations.

This is a good man, whose life represents an arc of 50 years of
American history.

thank you, paul harris

Fugitive to surrender in decades-old case

Demian Bulwa,Laura Rena Murray, Chronicle Staff Writer

Nov. 9, 2011 San Francisco Chronicle

A 67-year-old man accused in a pair of long-ago attacks on police officers, including the 1971 slaying of a San Francisco sergeant, is poised to turn himself in this week after more than four decades in hiding, his attorney said Tuesday.

Ronald Stanley Bridgeforth - an artifact of a turbulent era and an alleged former warrior for a violent offshoot of the Black Panthers - plans to plead guilty to firing on South San Francisco officers who tried to arrest him for credit card fraud at a discount store in 1968, said his attorney, Paul Harris.

No longer a young activist and community organizer, Bridgeforth now has a wife, two grown sons, a master's degree and a pair of arthritic hips, Harris said. Last week, Bridgeforth resigned from a job teaching and counseling students at an undisclosed college.

While prepared to accept punishment, Harris said, Bridgeforth will fight more serious charges awaiting him in San Francisco.

There, he was one of eight men charged in 2007 with murdering police Sgt. John Young at Ingleside Station on Aug. 29, 1971. Young was killed when at least three men burst in, with one firing a shotgun through an opening in a bulletproof glass window.

The men, along with a ninth alleged Black Liberation Army veteran, were also charged with conspiring to kill officers over the course of several years.

Case dissolved

Bridgeforth, the alleged getaway driver, remains the subject of a murder warrant, but the landscape of the case has changed radically since the charges were filed.

State prosecutors, who took over the case from the city, never took it to trial, dismissing charges against six men while securing no-contest pleas on reduced charges from two others who were already serving life prison terms for other crimes. The last of the charges against those defendants were dropped in August.

Harris said Bridgeforth was never in the Black Liberation Army and never took part in the killing of peace officers, but was haunted by regret over the earlier South San Francisco incident.

Harris said he and his co-counsel, Jason Cueva, will surrender their client at 8:45 a.m. Thursday at San Mateo County Superior Court in Redwood City.

"He has two sons, and he wants them to be the kind of man he is now, not the kind of man who he was that one day in November 1968," said Harris, who once helped defend Black Panthers co-founder Huey Newton.

Bridgeforth was not feeling the breath of law enforcement on his neck, according to his attorney. "He did not decide to surrender because there was any breach in his security," Harris said. "In fact, most people thought he was dead."

Many investigators who have pursued Bridgeforth for years declined to comment Tuesday, while saying they had no independent confirmation he would surrender.

Lynda Gledhill, a spokeswoman for state Attorney General Kamala Harris, declined to comment on the San Francisco case.

Karen Guidotti, the chief deputy district attorney in San Mateo County, said prosecutors are putting together records from archives in preparation for Bridgeforth's potential appearance.

"We'll wait and see, won't we," Guidotti said. "It will be interesting to find out what Mr. Bridgeforth has been up to since 1969, and what possible motive he may have to surrender himself at this particular time."

Stolen credit cards

Defense attorney Harris said that in the South San Francisco incident, Bridgeforth and two other men - both of whom were later charged in the San Francisco police killing - were confronted after trying to use stolen credit cards at a White Front discount store on El Camino Real.

When a police car pulled up and blocked the getaway car, Harris said, Bridgeforth - who was 24 - jumped out of the backseat and opened fire. He struck the squad car but not the officers, who returned fire and wounded Bridgeforth in the foot before arresting him.

Guidotti said records show that Bridgeforth pleaded guilty to assault with a deadly weapon on March 17, 1969, but jumped bail and did not show up for sentencing less than a month later.

He was briefly detained in San Francisco in 1971, in a car with a gun, but was released before police realized he was a wanted man.

How Bridgeforth spent his years as a fugitive remained a mystery Tuesday. Harris gave a few details, saying his client initially spent a year hiding in Africa, eventually married, raised two sons, worked as a janitor before earning a master's degree, and finally landed the college job.

Echoing an argument that was made by many of the defense lawyers in the San Francisco case, Harris said, "He's lived an exemplary life."