Report: Unhoused Man Seen Alive Before Being Crushed During Vallejo Cleanup

An unhoused man was seen alive on the morning he was crushed to death during a city-run trash cleanup in Vallejo on Christmas Eve, according to a death investigation report released to KQED.

The Solano County Coroner’s Office late last month identified the man as 58-year-old James Edward Oakley II, originally of American Canyon. Local advocates for unhoused residents said they knew him as a longtime member of the homeless community who had for some time lived in the area bordering Vallejo and American Canyon, where he was killed.

New details revealed by the death investigation report shed light on what happened that day and raise questions about how city workers handled the cleanup.

“It just shows more and more the ineptitude of the city, how they just botched the whole thing,” said Sean O’Malley, an unhoused Vallejo resident who was a friend of Oakley’s. “It’s just crazy. It’s horrible.”

In a statement, Vallejo City Manager Andrew Murray said the city is “deeply saddened by this tragic accident” and is in the process of reviewing its policies and procedures. The mayor and council members did not respond to KQED’s requests for comment, but at a Tuesday meeting of the City Council, Mayor Andrea Sorce called for a special session on homelessness.

According to the report prepared by Solano County Sheriff’s Deputy Jessica Dew, who responded to the scene, waste collection workers with the company Recology told police they had approached the site to pick up trash earlier that morning but opted against it when they saw a man among the items.

City officials described the area as an “illegal dumping” site. People who knew Oakley said he was living there after being asked to leave a nearby shed.

When a Vallejo public works crew arrived to clear the trash later that morning, they reported seeing a mattress covered with a “tarp,” along with several tote bags, a shopping cart and bags of trash. Workers reported kicking the mattress and calling out, asking if anyone was there, according to the death investigation. When they didn’t get a response, they started clearing the items without lifting the “tarp” covering the mattress.

Dew clarified in her report that she did not see a tarp but noted that blankets and clothing were piled on the mattress.

The backhoe operator then used the machine’s front bucket to crush the mattress before scooping it up. As the driver moved it toward a nearby dump truck, another worker spotted a human leg hanging from the bucket.

When Dew got to the site, Oakley’s body had been taken out of the backhoe bucket and Dew noted blood inside. Oakley and the mattress were both in the roadway, next to a dump truck. Dew noted the trash pile “appeared to have a void where the mattress was previously sitting.”

Dew wrote in her report that she found a wallet next to Oakley containing his California ID card. In his back pocket, he had $1.59.

An autopsy and death investigation by the coroner’s office determined that Oakley died from multiple blunt force injuries caused by the backhoe crushing the mattress he was lying on. The toxicology report showed Oakley had methamphetamine but no alcohol in his system.

As a high school student in the ’80s, Oakley had been a celebrated athlete. He later served prison sentences for manslaughter and drug charges and struggled with drug addiction, according to court records and articles in the Napa Valley Register.

O’Malley first met Oakley a couple of years ago when his car broke down, and Oakley offered him a jump. “I thought it was really cool. I didn’t even know him,” he said, describing Oakley as “a gentle giant.” The two went on to play dice together regularly.

“He said my dice were loaded because he always lost,” O’Malley said, laughing at the recollection. “That’s what I say, too, when I lose.”

According to the death investigation report, Oakley is survived by his father, sister and two adult children.

The Vallejo Police Department investigated the death and found no indication of “intent to cause harm, bodily injury or death,” city officials said, and the district attorney’s office found there wasn’t enough evidence to file criminal charges.

At the time of the incident, Vallejo officials said only that a dead body had been discovered during a cleanup at an illegal dumping site. Two months later, the city acknowledged Oakley had been crushed by city workers, calling it a “tragic accident.”

At a vigil for Oakley outside Vallejo City Hall on Tuesday, O’Malley and other activists called on the city to reconsider its approach to clearing homeless encampments.

“We’re out here saying James should never have died,” said Tiny Gray-Garcia, co-founder of POOR Magazine. “We have to change [this] policy of hate because more of us are going to die.”

She suspects similar deaths often go unreported. “The case of James is just one that we saw, and they can’t deny it,” she said.

O’Malley said he and other advocates are working on a slate of guidelines to give the city around handling encampment removals and debris cleanups. The recommendations include providing dumpsters so garbage doesn’t pile up and offering services before clearing camps.

“If anything comes from this, it’ll be them changing their policies,” O’Malley said. “How many more people need to die?”