Husband of social worker killed in S.F. clinic stabbing readies lawsuit against city

The husband of a UCSF social worker who was fatally stabbed in December while working at San Francisco General Hospital's HIV clinic plans to sue the city, alleging officials failed to provide clinic workers with adequate security before Alberto Rangel's death.

The wrongful death claim, a precursor to a lawsuit, was filed by Stuart Moulder on Friday morning. It accuses the city of failing to take steps to protect healthcare providers at its facilities despite being aware of "persistent and escalating threats" to its workers from a patient now facing a murder charge.

San Francisco officials have 45 days to respond to Moulder before he can file a lawsuit. The claim did not specify how much money Moulder was seeking. San Francisco Department of Public Health officials directed questions about the claim to the city attorney's office.

"Mr. Rangel's death is a tragedy, and our thoughts are with his loved ones," said Jen Kwart, spokesperson for the city attorney's office. "We will review the claim and respond to the claimant in a timely manner."

Nick Casper, Moulder's attorney, said the claim was intended to compel a deeper "public accounting" of what the city knew about threats to its healthcare providers in the weeks, months and years before Rangel was killed.

There were scant safeguards in place when Wilfredo Tortolero-Arriechi, 34, allegedly walked into the clinic, which had no metal detectors, records show. The claim alleges that the city could have responded more diligently to the threats, citing how swiftly security measures - including installing metal detectors and the hiring of security guards - were implemented just days after the incident. Following the stabbing, the public health department pledged to spend millions of dollars to bolster security at city medical centers and to adjust how health officials handle threats made by potentially dangerous patients.

"Alberto gave his whole heart to this city," said Moulder, a chemical engineer from New Zealand who married Rangel in 2013. "I want him to be remembered not only for the tragedy of his death, but for the extraordinary beauty, compassion, creativity and humanity he brought into the lives of so many people."

Tortolero-Arriechi, allegedly stabbed 51-year-old Rangel on Dec. 4 after showing up at Ward 86 to confront his physician, with whom he had become fixated on, records show. Records show that the physician was being guarded by a San Francisco sheriff's deputy on the opposite side of a clinic when Tortolero-Arriechi - who allegedly entered the clinic armed with a knife - encountered Rangel, who tried to calm him down.

As Rangel tried to escort the patient back to the elevator, Tortolero-Arriechi allegedly attacked him with a kitchen knife, prosecutors said. Tortolero-Arriechi pleaded not guilty to a murder charge.

In the weeks leading up to the attack, staffers at Ward 86 were pressing their superiors and the public health department's security director about the patient's escalating behavior, an internal audit showed. Still, necessary measures to protect staff - such as installing a metal detector, restricting entry to the clinic or increasing security personnel, were not taken, the audit said.

The attack followed years of warnings by whistleblowers and sanctions by state regulators over safety concerns and assaults on staff by patients at San Francisco General Hospital. Records show the hospital averaged six assaults a month on staff that caused injuries and had logged an increasing number of violent workplace incidents.

The 13-page audit, released by city health officials five months after the killing, outlined a series of critical failures at the hospital and laid bare the ways in which the city's department of public health lacked necessary protections to identify, investigate and manage potentially dangerous patients such Tortolero-Arriechi.

The report also showed the hospital's security director, Basil Price, and the San Francisco Sheriff's Office, which provided some security services at the hospital, discussed the reports about Tortolero-Arriechi's behavior but were unable to contact him. On the day Tortolero-Arriechi allegedly announced his plans to come to Ward 86, only a single sheriff's deputy was dispatched to guard the doctor.

Rangel, who had worked at Ward 86 since 2021, died from his injuries two days after the attack. Vigils for the slain man drew dozens of colleagues, friends and acquaintances who described him as a natural nurturer, imaginative artist and optimist who found meaning in supporting wounded people often living on the margins of society.

In the aftermath of Rangel's killing, public health department officials committed $15 million a year to bolster security and hired four security professionals to join a department that was previously managed by a single employee. Officials launched a 24/7 threat management team, developed formal threat escalation protocols, and tightened security around the clinic by restricting entryways into the building. public health officials said they were "not shying away" from areas where the department must improve.

Moulder's attorney, Casper, described Rangel's death as an "entirely foreseeable tragedy" that was "not a bolt from the blue."

"Stuart lives his life kind of constantly in the shadow of what was taken from him," Casper said. "It's as profound a loss as a human being could suffer."

Copyright 2026 Tribune Content Agency. All Rights Reserved.

This story was originally published May 29, 2026 at 10:43 AM.