A San Francisco Superior Court judge on Monday ordered a 35-year-old man to stand trial for the December killing of a UCSF social worker who was stabbed while working at Ward 86, San Francisco General Hospital’s HIV clinic.
The preliminary hearing, which lasted less than two hours, included testimony from the city’s chief medical examiner and two sheriff’s deputies who responded to the Dec. 4 attack. The defendant, Wilfredo Tortolero-Arriechi, sat quietly beside his attorney, deputy public defender Sylvia Nguyen, and was assisted by a Spanish-speaking interpreter.
The hearing is a significant milestone in the case against Tortolero-Arriechi, who pleaded not guilty to the murder charge. Immediately after his arrest, he was placed on a psychiatric hold that he remained under for weeks. Since then, he has been held in custody…