A San Francisco official celebrated for his jail reform activism is under fire for allegedly abusive relationships with women — and freely ranted about Jews on social media while serving on multiple City Hall boards, The California Post can exclusively reveal.
William Monroe Palmer, president of the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department Oversight Board, shared a plethora of disturbing Facebook and Instagram posts promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories, fringe books about Jewish world control along with diatribes about women, Christians, and the benefits of polygamy.
In one April 21 Facebook, Palmer shared a video from a self-described “prophet” ZuhCar El Le Azar, who slams Christians for not doing “the research” about Jews.
Azar cites an obscure racist tome called Chosen People From the Caucasus — which blames Jews for the transatlantic slave trade and argues that Jewish success is due to “lingering Neanderthal aggression” — and flashes an AI-generated Jewish caricature.
“Is it because you were raised like that? After Trump and the Epstein files, genocide in Israel and the historical racist abuse you are still voting as Demoncrats and Rethuglicans?” Palmer wrote while sharing the hateful post.
On April 30, the self-described human rights advocate shared a Facebook post from the Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge, a Black supremacist sect affiliated with the Black Hebrew Israelite movement.
The Israelite School of Universal Practical Knowledge has been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center for racist, antisemitic and misogynistic views, which claim that Jews have “stolen their identity and ‘birthright.’”
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In the video, a man wearing a loud T-shirt reading “Real Jews, not the fake ones” delivers an unhinged race-based interpretation of the Book of Genesis.
In other posts, Palmer — who also advises on jail sentences for the San Francisco District Attorney’s Sentencing Commission — suggested on Instagram that Kamala Harris would try to increase the incomes of Jewish people if elected president and promoted a conspiracy theory about “Zio Bolsheviks.”
In a video shared by Palmer, creator Erik Warsaw claimed “Zio Bolsheviks” in Russia had banned antisemitism to “preserve their privilege and power.”
“When are we going to acknowledge the obvious?” Palmer wrote on Instagram in August 23, attaching a video of a man rambling that Ashkenazi Jews are “a conspiracy.”
“These posts are unambiguously antisemitic and the fact that he has shared so many of them reveals a clear pattern of agreement with the content,” said Jeremy Russell, spokesperson for the Jewish Community Relations Council of the Bay Area.
Palmer has been accused by four women of abuse and claimed homelessness to get out of 97 parking tickets with fines of $9,743, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Some members of the Board of Supervisors, which appointed Palmer to the Sheriff’s Oversight Board as part of a criminal justice reform push, have called on Palmer to resign after allegations of violence against women emerged.
“On top of the other allegations, this shows a person unfit to serve in any role on the Oversight Board, let alone as president. We join the others in the community urging his removal,” Russell added.
“Mr. Palmer’s expressed views and alleged criminal conduct do not represent the views of the District Attorney’s Office or the Sentencing Commission,” the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office said in a statement.
“The views he has expressed are troubling and the alleged conduct is completely incompatible with expectations for Sentencing Commission members,” the office said.
Palmer’s extreme social media takes didn’t stop with women.
Referring to himself as a “card carrying masculine alpha man,” he claimed in April 2023 that “nature selected men to have multiple wives,” blasted interracial marriage and attacked feminism.
“In the beginning the Creator created a Helpmate, not a feminist that neglects the family to be a Boss Chic, doing Slut Walks with an Only Fans with pronouns,” he shared on Facebook in August 2025.
In a phone call, Palmer denied he is antisemitic and claimed he is dating a Jewish woman he was “supposed to meet up with tonight.”
“I’m a person who seeks knowledge,” he claimed.
Asked about sharing antisemitic conspiracy theories, he called himself an “avid researcher of history.”
“I know for a fact based upon my research and going to different places … that the people in the Bible, the children of Israel, they were not from Eastern European counties,” Palmer alleged.
Palmer was appointed to the Sheriff’s Oversight Board in 2021 as part of a push to include people with “lived experience” to shape the jail system.
He was praised in the media for supposedly turning his life around, using his experience to advocate for inmates through his nonprofit, “Life After Next.”
Palmer, 55, had served 31 years of a life sentence in prison for a crime he committed as a teenager.
The California Supreme Court had ruled his sentencing as “excessive punishment,” but his run-ins with the criminal justice system didn’t end with his release in 2019.
Officers have pulled over Palmer at least three times in recent months for traffic violations. In one body camera video, Palmer complained about being arrested for refusing to give his driver’s license, according to the Chronicle.
“I’m the president of the Sheriff’s Department Oversight Board… You really think this is going to be swept under the rug?” Palmer was recorded saying.
More serious allegations have emerged after four women accused him of violence, including rape, and another woman put a restraining order on him.
In December 2024, a Sonoma County judge granted a restraining order that told Palmer to not abuse or contact his ex-girlfriend and her family for a year. Palmer was arrested again in August 2025 on suspicion of domestic battery and false imprisonment, but the district attorney said there was insufficient evidence.
In another alleged incident in Portugal, a woman claimed Palmer became violent after she refused to have sex with him. No charges were filed.
Palmer denied the violence allegations and said he planned to hold a community justice forum to tell his side of the story.
He went on an unusually strange explanation for his run-ins, blaming the police for targeting him and putting “psycho” women in his path.
“If you tell some people, ‘No, I’m not interested anymore,’ it’s like assault and battery,” Palmer said. “I am not lying. I am willing to do an undercover investigation to prove that this is happening every day.”
His recounting of the alleged incidents claimed that he did no harm, but that the women involved falsely cried out that he hurt them.
Past supervisors had already called on him to resign after the allegations surfaced, but he refused and even presided on the board from within the jail.
On his parking tickets, Palmer said low-income people should not have to pay to park outside their apartment.
“I deserve the right to own a car, and I believe that what they are doing is unfair,” Palmer told The Chronicle. “I’m just the person who has the guts to say, ‘No, I’m not doing that.’ If your city budget is dependent on tickets and impound, there’s a problem.”
The city ended up forgiving most of his tickets after he applied for a waiver.