S.F. official: Supe retaliated against cadet
San Francisco Supervisor Shamann Walton violated city policy by retaliating against a sheriff ’s cadet who said Walton verbally harassed him while using a racial slur at a City Hall security checkpoint last summer, the city’s human resources director recently concluded.
The cadet, Emare Butler, had accused Walton of publicly berating him after Butler asked the supervisor to remove his belt before going through a metal detector on June 24, 2022. According to a sheriff’s memo describing the incident, Walton allegedly said, “it is N-words like you that looks like me that is always the problem” and referred to security protocols as “N-word shit” several times. Both Walton and Butler are Black.
The San Francisco Department of Human Resources originally closed the case after Walton was admonished by a sheriff ’s official, but Butler later pressed for further review. Butler, 44, said he wanted to clear his name after Walton disputed his account of the incident.
Human Resources Director Carol Isen wrote to Butler on Friday, saying the city had completed its investigation into Butler’s “additional allegations of harassment and retaliation.” After conducting interviews, reviewing Butler’s written complaint along with other documents and analyzing “related information,” Isen said evidence “further substantiates” but “does not alter” her July 2022 finding that Walton had behaved inappropriately but the sheriff ’s office had adequately responded to the situation. Isen also said in her Friday letter that, “based upon a preponderance of the evidence,” she concluded that Walton had violated the city’s harassment-free workplace policy by retaliating against the cadet.
In addition to the initial incident in which Butler said Walton berated him using racial slurs, Butler said Walton also retaliated against him for reporting the incident, by questioning Butler’s account and motives in public comments, including to the press and on social media.
Walton said last year that he “would never expect the sheriff’s department to provide an accurate account of what transpired between two Black men.” Walton also alleged that he had been mistreated by Butler and other sheriff ’s officials because of his efforts to seek more accountability from law enforcement, including a successful 2020 ballot measure he sponsored to create an oversight board for the sheriff’s office.
Despite being found to have violated city policy, Walton is unlikely to face any formal consequences because he is an elected official.
In theory, Walton’s colleagues on the Board of Supervisors could try to take the symbolic step of voting to admonish him over the incident, but the board does not appear interested. Most of the other supervisors did not comment on the matter after it surfaced in news reports last year, though Mayor London Breed and Supervisor Myrna Melgar did say Walton should apologize.
Butler told the Chronicle he’s ready to put the whole issue behind him.
“Honestly, at this point, I’m just kind of tired of dealing with it,” he said.
Walton, for his part, pushed back on Isen’s recent conclusion.
“It’s a fallacy,” he told the Chronicle in a text message Tuesday. “I haven’t done anything but go to work and do my job.”
Isen also found that Walton’s chief of staff, Natalie Gee, had retaliated against Butler. In his request for further city review of the incident, Butler submitted screenshots of social media posts Gee made defending Walton and echoing his claim that he was being targeted because of his attempts to hold law enforcement accountable. Gee told the Chronicle on Tuesday that she could not comment because she had not yet been able to review Isen’s letter.
Board of Supervisors President Aaron Peskin said he did not expect his colleagues would take any action in response to Isen’s letter. “It was not Supervisor Walton’s finest moment, but we’re all human and sometimes we lose our cool,” he said.
Butler told city officials in an email last year that, the week before the incident, he had reached “a compromise” with Walton that would allow the supervisor to keep his belt on while passing through the security checkpoint sometimes. Under the compromise, Butler said he would scan Walton with a wand — but only as long as there was no crowd. On the day in question, however, there was a crowd, so Butler said he asked the supervisor to remove his belt to keep the line moving.
“After explaining that I would not be able to wand him, he got extremely angry saying he was not going to remove his belt and I was not going to win this argument,” Butler wrote, adding that Walton was also “asking me if I understand who he is.”
It was after that point that Walton allegedly made the “n-word” comments described in the sheriff’s memo. The memo said Walton “admitted that he had used the word a few times” and “acknowledged that it is a word that should not be used, although he explained … how he believed that the way he had used it could be defended.”
City Hall last August released two security-camera videos showing Walton gesticulating and talking to Butler after passing through the metal detector. Neither video had any sound.
After getting the most recent letter from Isen, Butler said he won’t be seeking any additional action from the city.
“I knew not much could be done,” he said. “I’m not gonna take it any further — it’s a waste of time and energy. I’m just gonna let it die. It’s unfortunate, but it’s just not worth it. You’re going up against a machine that refuses to move.”