{"id":7938,"date":"2026-08-28T14:08:04","date_gmt":"2026-08-28T14:08:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=7938"},"modified":"2026-08-28T14:08:04","modified_gmt":"2026-08-28T14:08:04","slug":"exclusive-49ers-sought-palo-alto-police-report-before-disclosing-shanahan-crash-records-show","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=7938","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive: 49ers sought Palo Alto police report before disclosing Shanahan crash, records show"},"content":{"rendered":"
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During the 11 days between a car crash that seriously injured San Francisco 49ers coach Kyle Shanahan and the team\u2019s announcement of the wreck, team officials repeatedly contacted Palo Alto police and said they wanted to review the collision report before releasing information to the media, records obtained by the Bay Area News Group show.<\/p>\n

Read more Victim of \u2018Happy Face Killer\u2019 identified 34 years after her body was found along a California highway<\/a><\/p>\n

The correspondence, obtained through a public records request, sheds new light on the handling of the July 14 crash in downtown Palo Alto, amid swirling questions about why the team waited to acknowledge it.<\/p>\n

While the records reveal the 49ers had direct access to police officials, including the former police chief, they do not indicate the team or the Palo Alto Police Department sought to conceal information about the crash. Police have said Shanahan did not receive special treatment after the collision.<\/p>\n

In one email to police, the 49ers\u2019 security director Larry Day said the team didn\u2019t want to share details of the crash with the media until it had seen the collision report.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just wanted to review the report today before we release any information to the Media,\u201d Day wrote.<\/p>\n

The department did not make the report available to the team until more than a week after the incident, which Palo Alto police Lt. Nicolas Martinez said in an email to this news organization is a typical timeline for producing a report to an authorized party. The team was entitled to the report because it owned the Tesla Model S that Shanahan was driving at the time of the crash, Martinez said.<\/p>\n

Greg Woods, a law enforcement expert and lecturer in San Jose, said it\u2019s not unusual for a mid-size police department like Palo Alto to take a week or more to process reports on non-fatal collisions with no criminal involvement. The department said the case was not a criminal matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt wouldn\u2019t warrant that kind of front-of-the-line attention,\u201d Woods said.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

Team officials declined to explain why they waited to disclose the crash, which occurred during the offseason, or whether the collision report or their communication with police influenced the timing of the team\u2019s statement.<\/p>\n

The two-car collision, which Shanahan said was his fault\u00a0for driving distracted, left him with a severe concussion, a broken nose, fractured ribs and more than 40 stitches to his face. The other driver was not seriously injured. Shanahan had limited involvement at the beginning of training camp in late July and resumed full coaching duties in August.<\/p>\n

Although police identified Shanahan\u2019s handling of a phone as a factor in the crash, he was not cited. Police have said officers have discretion over when to issue citations.\u00a0The Santa Clara County District Attorney\u2019s Office said the police department did not refer the non-criminal traffic matter to prosecutors.<\/p>\n

Steven Clark, a legal analyst and former Santa Clara County prosecutor, told this news organization police frequently elect not to cite drivers involved in collisions while using their phones, especially when officers do not witness the crash.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

On the morning of July 16, two days after the collision, Day, the security director, emailed a police administrative assistant to request a copy of the collision report once it was completed, according to the records.<\/p>\n

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Day wrote that former Police Chief Andrew Binder, whom he described in the email as a former colleague at the San Jose Police Department, had advised him to reach out to the assistant for help with the request. Citing insurance purposes, Day also requested the other driver\u2019s vehicle information, which he received by email that morning.<\/p>\n

The following week, on July 22, he emailed the assistant again to check the status of the report.<\/p>\n

Just before 1 p.m. on July 23, the assistant emailed Day to notify him that the team could retrieve the report via the department\u2019s online records portal or at its office. At 9 a.m. on July 25, the day of the team\u2019s camp-opening news conference, the 49ers issued a brief statement on the collision. Minutes later, ESPN published an article detailing the crash and Shanahan\u2019s injuries.<\/p>\n

Neither the team nor police would confirm whether the 49ers obtained the report after it was made available to them.<\/p>\n

In addition to the emails, call logs obtained by this news organization show that team officials held at least four phone calls with two lieutenants and a program manager on July 22 and July 24. The logs do not indicate what was discussed.<\/p>\n

The 49ers declined to respond to questions about the content of the calls. Martinez said the phone discussions concerned the status of the report, when it would be available for release and when the team could obtain a copy. The team also notified the department of a possible press release, Martinez said.<\/p>\n

Shanahan, who returned to practice last month, first discussed the collision in a meeting with reporters on July 28. He refuted news reports that the other driver, a 21-year-old woman, was at fault, explaining he took his eyes off the road to retrieve a dropped cellphone and then veered into oncoming traffic. He later said the Tesla he was driving was on autopilot before the crash.<\/p>\n

Palo Alto police that day confirmed Shanahan was at fault and said a clerical error had led a state database to wrongly blame the other driver.<\/p>\n

Earlier that morning, the team\u2019s vice president of security operations, Jeremy Jones, texted Lt. Martinez to ask why the other driver was listed in the online database as at fault in the crash, according to police records. Martinez responded that the entry was an error and that the department was working to correct it.<\/p>\n

Martinez also had multiple calls with a team official on the day of Shanahan\u2019s first public comments and the following day, according to the records. He did not provide the official\u2019s name and declined to specify exactly what was discussed, saying that it was related to the collision report.<\/p>\n

The department has declined to share the report with this news organization, citing provisions of California public records law that give police departments and other agencies discretion over the release of incident reports to journalists and other non-involved parties. The 49ers also declined to provide a copy.<\/p>\n

Read more New era for Bellarmine football? First-year coach has a plan to resurrect former heavyweight<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

49ers had repeated contact with Palo Alto police after Shanahan crash, records show<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5717,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"yoast_head":"\nExclusive: 49ers sought Palo Alto police report before disclosing Shanahan crash, records show - Next City Digest<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=7938\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Exclusive: 49ers sought Palo Alto police report before disclosing Shanahan crash, records show - Next City Digest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"49ers had repeated contact with Palo Alto police after Shanahan crash, records show\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/nextcitydigest.com\/?p=7938\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Next City Digest\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-28T14:08:04+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/13065d40d633843429ac57d4e5c06f9b\"},\"headline\":\"Exclusive: 49ers sought Palo Alto police report before disclosing Shanahan crash, records show\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-28T14:08:04+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938\"},\"wordCount\":1095,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2026\\\/07\\\/72bd0dbf0f2dd08655f9f37f1b9cc590-scaled.webp\",\"articleSection\":[\"Sports\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/nextcitydigest.com\\\/?p=7938\",\"name\":\"Exclusive: 49ers sought Palo Alto police report before disclosing Shanahan crash, records show - 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