Elon Fired Him, Now His AI Writes Every Police Report | Daniel Francis (Abel Police)
Daniel Francis built Abel Police after watching Oakland PD take 45 minutes to respond to a domestic violence call, and now claims every 115 officers on his platform saves one life per year.
- Abel’s math: every 115 officers on the platform saves one life per year; 10% worse software at 1,100 users means someone dies.
- SFPD’s 2021 staffing analysis showed officers spend one-third of their shift writing reports — the key insight behind Abel.
- Daniel impersonated a laid-off Twitter employee, got hired, then fired by Elon Musk; Musk called to apologize.
- He completed 39 police ride-alongs and requires every Abel employee to do at least one before working with police data.
- Richmond PD became Abel’s first agency after SFPD and most East Bay departments rejected him; Richmond was understaffed and desperate.
- His ‘Working at Abel’ doc states: Daniel is the floor on engineering talent and the ceiling on being an asshole — violating either gets you fired.
- He argues solo founders should give early engineers 5% equity instead of 50% to a co-founder, retaining the ability to fire underperformers.
- Fitness app (prior company) reached $30K MRR before he exited to pursue Abel after the Twitter stint shifted his mindset from mercenary to missionary.
2026-04-01 · Watch on YouTube