In late October 2019, a group of Vallejo Police Department detectives were having lunch and talking about the preemptive PG&E power blackouts that plunged much of the North Bay into darkness. According to an internal investigation report obtained by KQED, Detective Sgt. Mathew Mustard told a racist joke.
Mustard, who is white, said the nearby town of Dixon was “as dark as Coley’s ass,” according to the investigation into the alleged incident.
To explain the joke, Mustard said that in the small town where his grandfather lived, there was only one Black man, who was known as Coley, according to the documents. Since Coley had dark skin, whenever people in the town talked about something dark, they said “as dark as Coley’s ass,” Mustard said.
Detective Cpl. Jason Scott, who is Black, felt the joke was directed at him, the report shows, and on Nov. 4, 2019, Scott filed a complaint against Mustard alleging the comment was part of a larger pattern of discrimination by his supervisor.
This is yet another scandal for a police department that has been besieged by lawsuits, allegations of misconduct, and unlawful shootings, even as its police chief continues to promise accountability and reform. The leaked report also shows that three prominent detectives weren’t truthful with investigators looking into Scott’s complaint, which could have far-reaching consequences for criminal cases built on their testimony.
Shawny Williams was sworn in as the city’s first Black police chief just eight days after Scott filed his internal complaint. Black officers make up 10% of Vallejo’s police force, according to the department’s website, while census figures show the city’s residents are about 20% African American.
Williams has said he is committed to regaining the public’s trust. The California Department of Justice is working with the city to implement reforms aimed at improving the department’s accountability and use-of-force policies. The state DOJ is also looking into the police killing of Sean Monterrosa, which led to a lawsuit, protests and allegations of evidence destruction. Williams also launched an outside investigation into allegations that officers participated in “badge bending” to mark their fatal on-duty shootings, a shocking revelation first reported by Open Vallejo, a nonprofit news site.
In an email, Vallejo Mayor Robert McConnell said that he wasn’t made aware of the racial bias investigation and said it would have violated the police officers’ rights if he had been. McConnell said his broader vision for the department “is to expand their ability and inclination to serve as a group of individuals who view themselves more as care providers who must do a difficult job, but with compassion and skills that are deployed with intelligence."
A spokesperson for the Vallejo Police Department did not respond to questions about the internal investigation, but pointed to the department’s reform efforts.
Ellis Investigations (formerly Ellis and Makus LLP), the law firm that prepared the investigative report obtained by KQED, was hired to look into Scott’s complaint of racial bias.
Scott has since left the Vallejo Police Department and now works for the Solano County district attorney. He did not respond to messages requesting comment.
Scott’s complaint alleged that his boss, Mustard, repeatedly undermined and denigrated him because he is Black, according to the investigative report. He said that on two occasions Mustard called him “boy,” a historically racist and demeaning reference. In a 2011 decision where a white supervisor called a Black employee "boy," the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found the term can be proof of "racial animus."
This is not the first time Mustard has faced allegations of misconduct. The Appeal, a nonprofit news outlet, reported that Mustard withheld exculpatory evidence from criminal defendants in 2012 and 2020. In 2016, Mustard was sued over his handling of the infamous “Gone Girl” case in which he, along with the Vallejo Police Department, accused a couple of staging a home invasion and kidnapping. The city settled with the couple for $2.5 million in 2018.
That same year, Mustard was promoted to sergeant and put in charge of the VPD’s Investigations Division and the Evidence and Property Unit, according to the investigative report, where he was in charge of Scott.
