The officers made racist jokes, talked about targeting Black people for violence, made light of George Floyd’s murder, and lamented that they couldn’t beat suspects more when officers w…
Editors’ note: This story contains racist and offensive language detailed in an investigative report by the Contra Costa District Attorney’s Office.
“I’ll bury that n—-r in my fields,” Sgt. Joshua Evans texted Officer Morteza Amiri on April 24, 2020, according to the report. He later added, “And yes….it was a hard R on purpose.”The 21-page report, authored by Contra Costa District Attorney Senior Inspector Larry Wallace, and obtained by this newspaper on Tuesday, is one of two such documents.
On Friday, Contra Costa Superior Court Judge Clare Maier agreed the texts should be released to attorneys in a four-defendant gang attempted murder case, without a protection order. Maier ruled that the material, while offensive, did not deserve the same protections as details of the criminal probe. “I don’t support in any way any racist-type comments or statements and things of that nature,” Barbanica said. “But, if an officer is going to be held accountable, I don’t want to step out and start making comments and possibly create a situation where that officer can no longer have to be held accountable.”
In one exchange, Evans acknowledged that a woman “called me a racist cop.” Sgt. Rick Hoffman, the president of the city’s police union, laughed at the comment and said, “Well, she has a point.” Referring to a young woman who is a prominent police reform advocate in Antioch, Evans made a racist and sexualized remark in September 2020. Later that month, patrol officers Calvin Prieto and Andrea Rodriguez talked about aggressively ticketing people to “make these n—as eat s—.” In March 2021, Officer Jonathan Adams, referring to Black people, wrote, “Bro. They all look the same” and Rombough responded, “I feel like I’m at the zoo.
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