Vallejo police union ignored subpoena in Sean Monterrosa civil rights case, attorneys allege

VALLEJO – The Vallejo Police Officers Association has not responded for nearly a year to a subpoena by attorneys representing the family of Sean Monterrosa, who was shot and killed by Vallejo police in 2020, leading the attorneys to ask a federal court to compel the police union to cooperate.

Attorney John Coyle, who represents the Monterrosa family, filed a motion to compel evidence from the police union on Tuesday, writing that there “has been a complete and total failure to respond” to the subpoena.

According to Coyle, he submitted a copy of the subpoena to VPOA attorney Michael Rains on Feb. 9 and the VPOA was formally served with the subpoena on July 5, but no one ever replied.

Failing to respond to a subpoena, a lawful order requiring a response, could result in a person or organization being held in contempt of court and subject to sanctions. Federal law requires any objection to the subpoena to be filed within 14 days after the subpoena is served.

Rains did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Monterrosa was killed by Vallejo police Detective Jarrett Tonn on June 2, 2020, when Tonn fired through the windshield of an unmarked pickup truck as he and two other officers were entering a Walgreens parking lot while responding to reports of looting. Tonn was fired for the shooting but is expected to appeal the decision to arbitration.

Monterrosa’s family filed a civil rights lawsuit later that year and the case has dragged through the courts since. The Monterrosa family’s attorneys sought nine subpoenas in February, including to the police union, seeking information about the practice of officers bending the tips of their star-shaped badges to mark an on-duty shooting.

The city of Vallejo filed a motion objecting to subpoenas to Cole Pro Media and Critical Incident Videos, sister PR firms that the city contracted to assist with its messaging about the scandal, and former Sonoma County Sheriff Rob Giordano, an outside investigator the city hired to conduct an investigation into the badge-bending practice.

The city has sought to conceal Giordano’s report from public release, arguing it is a police personnel record and exempt from the California Public Records Act, a determination that has been disputed by the American Civil Liberties Union.

Testimony in Solano County Superior Court last year indicated that former police Lt. Kent Tribble and Officer Gary Jones bent Tonn’s badge for one of his three shootings prior to killing Monterrosa.

The city did not object to the subpoena to the VPOA. The subpoena requests all correspondence, emails, communications, messages, documents, interviews or reports from the union that relate to Tonn, badge bending, or former police Capt. John Whitney, who revealed the practice publicly in a wrongful termination lawsuit he filed in 2020.

Rains, on behalf of the VPOA, confirmed the practice in a letter to Giordano in late 2020 arguing that it was to signify officers surviving a dangerous incident.

In an interview in December, Rains told the Vallejo Sun that the officers implicated in badge bending were exonerated by Giordano’s report. He faulted the city and former police Chief Shawny Williams, who resigned in November, for a lack of transparency.

“It was simply something to say, you survived an incident, you could have been killed, glad you made it,” Rains said. “It wasn't what it was portrayed as publicly. Shawny knew it, and no one's ever set the record straight.”

Rains said that when he accompanied police officers to interviews with Giordano, some officers were in tears, because they shot someone who was trying to kill them and now were being accused of extolling killing people.

“They didn't want to ever have to fire their gun, that was one of the worst things in the world but they had to do it because they were about to die,” Rains said. “They've excoriated a bunch of cops for badge bending and they should tell the truth about it.”