Kristen Guhde only wanted a home when she moved into her condo conversion in a historic building on Capp Street. She says instead, she got protracted drama and conflict with controlling and vexatious neighbors at her homeowners’ association. But unlike the many other neighborhood disputes in San Francisco, the neighbors are a San Francisco police commissioner and his deputy public defender wife. Guhde says the couple has been making her life hell while also allegedly protecting another neighbor who attacked other people in the neighborhood, including with a blowtorch, from police.
“They’re trying to deprive me of every right as a human,” Guhde told The Voice in an interview. “I’ve never seen humans act this poorly before.” She describes her situation with her neighbors, Deputy Public Defender Ilona Solomon Yañez and Police Commissioner Jesus Yañez, as “a disturbing pattern of abuse, intimidation, and retaliation.”
Guhde first moved into her home in 2018, and in many ways it fulfilled her hopes for a home in the city. When The Voice visited her Tuesday, she pointed out what she called “perfect imperfections”— differences in details like mouldings and such — which mark the building’s history as being quickly built in the months after the 1906 earthquake and fire. “The railroad-style layout captures sunlight beautifully, with full southern exposure that fills my bedroom and kitchen in the morning and sets in my front office bay window at day’s end. The fully enclosed backyard is a safe space for my cat, Pippa, to patrol,” she told us.