Day 5 of Corpus hearing, former captain recalls quitting instead of arresting union head

So far in Day 5 in the removal hearings of San Mateo County Sheriff Christina Corpus, former Assistant Sheriff Matthew Fox was back on the stand, testifying about why he resigned from the office amid the chaotic aftermath following the release of a county commissioned report by retired Judge LaDoris Cordell. Former Capt. Brian Philip is testifying about his reassignment to less desirable jobs after asking questions about an internal affairs investigation and ultimately quitting when ordered to arrest deputies union president Carlos Tapia.

Cordell’s report focused on Corpus and her former chief of staff, Victor Aenlle. The report said the two were more than friends and were running the sheriff’s office through retaliation and intimidation.

Corpus is appealing the county Board of Supervisors’ decision to fire her due to allegations of corruption. Since the public hearing is not being live-streamed, the Post is posting updates from reporter Adriana Hernandez, who is in the courtroom. Check this page throughout the day for Hernandez’s latest.

11 a.m. — The fifth day of testimony continued with former Assistant Sheriff Matthew Fox, who spoke with hesitation.    

Fox said he never knew deputies’ union president Carlos Tapia’s time card code had been changed at the direction of sheriff’s Finance Director Stacey Stevenson. If he had known that, he wouldn’t have started the investigation, Fox said. There had been confusion over what time card code Tapia ought to use when doing union-related activities, Van Enriquez, payroll supervisor, testified yesterday.

Fox then called Undersheriff Dan Perea for information. Perea only told Fox that he didn’t want to participate in anything, didn’t know anything and didn’t do anything illegal, Fox said. 

“My head started spinning at that point,” Fox said with tears running down his face.  

Fox said he went through the Cordell report and didn’t know about the allegations surrounding the sheriff because his focus had been on Aenlle. 

Fox said that he was very hesitant to call Aenlle after everything he found out while reading the Cordell report.

Aenlle has not been in the courtroom this week.

During cross-examination, Corpus’s attorney Thomas Mazzucco said he’s known Fox’s family for years. Fox said that they may have met previously. 

Mazzucco asked Fox about the “clowns in the sheriff’s office” who were not supportive of Corpus, but the hearing officer, retired Judge James Emerson, told him not to use that language. 

“I can say there are people in the organization that didn’t want her to be successful,” Fox said. He said he had never seen this type of behavior in law enforcement.

11:30 a.m. — Mazzucco asked Fox to read an email he sent Corpus on Nov. 28, about two weeks after he resigned. 

“From my first days, I always wanted to show up for you, the (sheriff’s office) and carry out your vision each day,” Fox slowly read while crying and grabbing tissues to wipe his tears. “I was always your biggest supporter and still root for you amongst all the odds and gang mentality you face.” 

While Fox was reading, Mazzucco would say supportive things to Fox. Emerson told him it seemed like he was about to hold his hand while reading and to step away from Fox. 

Mazzucco asked Fox about the “gang” he mentioned in his email. Fox said there was a “band of people” in the Sheriff’s Office that didn’t want to see Corpus succeed. 

Mazzucco asked Fox about his memo to Perea asking for authorization to conduct the investigations. Fox said he had only requested information and was waiting to receive it. 

Mazzucco moved on to ask Fox about his involvement in the Cordell report. Fox said he reached out to Cordell and she asked how he had gotten her number. 

Mazzucco then asked Fox about his conversation with Chief Deputy District Attorney Shin-Mee Chang prior to Tapia’s arrest. 

Fox said Chang told him she trusted him and if he had probable cause, the District Attorney’s office wouldn’t stop him. However, Tapia was arrested without a warrant.   

Fox said he’s aware of the lawsuit Tapia has filed against the sheriff and includes him, but he hasn’t been served with papers that would start the case. 

As Fox was dismissed from the witness stand, Mazzucco followed him, calling out “Matt” from the back of the courtroom. 

Noon — Former Capt. Brian Philip was next on the witness stand. Philip, a longtime Palo Alto police officer, left the department to join Corpus’s team in 2023. Philip quit on Nov. 12, 2024, after being ordered to arrest Tapia. Philip is suing the county, saying he was forced to resign because he wouldn’t bow to the corruption in the sheriff’s office. 

Philip, Fox, Eamonn Allen and Mark Myers were sworn in as captains by Corpus on Aug. 9, 2023. The same day Aenlle was sworn in as head of administration and Stacey Stevenson as head of finance. 

Brook Dooley, an attorney for the county, asked Philip about a conversation he had with Perea about the investigation of Sgt. Javier Acosta. 

Javier Acosta was placed on leave after rumors of him having an inappropriate relationship with an intern started, according to a legal claim he has filed with the county. He was placed under house arrest without cause, according to his claim, and received a letter from the sheriff’s office saying he was under internal investigation. Javier Acosta has denied the allegations regarding the intern. Sgt. Hector Acosta said in his own claim that his brother was placed on leave in retaliation for his as head of the sergeant’s union. 

Philip said Perea told him he would be receiving a notice of complaint from Human Resources Manager Heather Enders regarding Javier Acosta. Enders sent Philip an email on Sept. 3 asking him to sign the notice, but he noticed it lacked information and didn’t sign. He sent an email to Enders asking for more information, he said. 

The notice was “written poorly,” Philip said. 

On Sept. 9, Philip said Perea had asked to meet with him. Former Assistant Sheriff Ryan Monaghan was also there. Perea said Philip was going to be transferred to work at the jail and to hand over the list of all his ongoing tasks, Philip said. 

Philip said his responsibilities “were stripped away” from him. 

Philip tried to ask Perea why he was being transferred, but Perea didn’t give him an explanation, he said. 

After the transfer, Philip sent an email on Sept. 25 to Corpus, Fox and Perea asking for clarification on where he stood as a captain. 

Dooley asked Philip about another meeting he had with Perea in November regarding the arrest of Tapia. 

Capt. Bill Fogerty called Philip and told him he was going to pick him up for a meeting with Perea. Fogerty also told Philip to bring his body camera.

Perea closed the door, turned on a white noise machine that eliminates the possibility of eavesdropping, and said to “sit down, it’s going to be one of those meetings,” Philip said. 

“Today at 1 or 2 p.m., we are going to place Tapia under arrest,” Perea said, according to Philip.

Philip asked for the reasoning behind the arrest, but Perea never gave one, he said.

“He ordered me to make the arrest. He said if I didn’t, we’d be back in his office to discuss my insubordination,” Philip said. 

He considered it an illegal arrest and was going to go to the DA’s office to report it, but Perea ordered him to sit back down, Philip said. 

“My choices were to resign,” Philip said. 

He placed his badge on the table and slid it towards Pera and said that wasn’t what he signed up for, Philip said, choking up and holding back tears. 

That was the end of his law enforcement career, Philip said. 

During cross-examination, Mariah Cooks, Corpus’s attorney, asked him questions about the investigation on Acosta, but Philip said he didn’t know any details.  

“I can’t testify because I wasn’t involved in the investigation,” Philip said.

Cooks asked Philip about his lawsuit, where he said that being sent to work at the jail was a “dead end.”  

Cooks asked if the corrections were the “heart and soul” of the sheriff’s office and Philip said it sounded like that was her opinion. 

Philip said the transfer to work at the jail felt punitive. 

Cooks asked Philip about a conversation he had with County Executive Mike Callagy after he resigned. 

“It was my right (to speak to Callagy),” Philip said, raising his eyebrows. Philip said that because Callagy manages the county, he told Callagy why he resigned. 

1 p.m. — Next on the witness stand was deputy Daniel Chu. 

Chu approves timecards and said he would review Tapia’s requests, Chu said. 

Chu said he would know if deputies wouldn’t show up to work and that was never the case with Tapia. 

Tapia would make Chu’s life easier as a supervisor because he would offer to work on Saturdays or Sundays, Chu said. He never saw inaccuracies in Tapia’s timecards, Chu said. 

If there were any inaccuracies in any timecard, Chu would ask for them to be resubmitted, he said. 

Chu said that he had no reason to believe that he would lie on his timecards. 

After Tapia was arrested, Chu said he wasn’t trained or disciplined for approving Tapia’s timecards.

Christopher Ulrich stepped up to ask Chu questions for cross-examination.

Ulrich asked about how timecards are reviewed. Chu said he would review them weekly and timecards could be submitted to any supervisor. Time cards can’t be submitted if they have missing information, Chu said. 

Ulrich presented the daily transportation schedule as evidence and the county attorney objected because Chu wasn’t working for that department at the time. 

“Is this witness going to know about this?” Emerson asked. 

Emerson asked Ulrich if they were wasting time.

Ulrich brought out calendar boards with Tapia’s overtime hours that he had Lt. Brandon Hensel mark up yesterday.  

The calendar boards that weren’t accepted as evidence yesterday, and the county’s attorneys objected to Ulrich presenting the calendar boards to Chu because it was from a previous witness. Emerson allowed Ulrich to continue. 

Ulrich also presented a spreadsheet detailing all the codes Tapia used for his timesheets, but the county objected again because Chu wouldn’t know about it. 

The evidence was already on the screens in the courtroom while Emerson was trying to decide whether to allow it. 

“What is this?” Chu said. Emerson asked Ulrich what he was trying to do. Ulrich said he was trying to point out what codes Tapia was using.   

2:30 p.m. — Lt. Jonathan Sebring was the next witness to testify. 

Sebring said he reviewed Aenlle’s background file when a local police agency asked to view it during an ongoing investigation. Aenlle was the subject of a criminal investigation and Sebring told Enders that Aenlle would have to go through another background check for a full-time position. 

In attorney Jan Little’s report that kicked off the Measure A hearings said that Aenlle was never charged with a crime, and the report doesn’t say what the allegations were about.

“I was concerned,” Sebring said. 

He was concerned about how this exposure could affect Corpus and the agency, so he spoke to Corpus, Sebring said. Corpus was gracious for bringing it to her attention and said she didn’t know Aenlle “like that,” according to Sebring. 

Corpus later called him and asked who else could access the file and if it was possible to make it visible to only him and her, Sebring said. 

“I was surprised, but complied,” Sebring said. Corpus later promoted him to lieutenant. 

Sebring was surprised he was promoted because he needed a bachelor’s degree for the position but Corpus removed the requirement, he said. 

3 p.m. — Sebring testified about an incident where he helped Jenna McAlpin, a civilian employee who worked for Aenlle. 

Executive Assistant Jennifer Valdez called Sebring to help McAlpin, who was crying. McAlpin told Sebring that Aenlle accused her of posting denigrating content about Corpus on social media. 

Sebring said he reported the incident to Monaghan and recommended McAlpin report it to HR. 

Sebring said Corpus thanked him for handling the situation, but that there are always two sides to every story. Corpus made a comment saying McAlpin was “mentally unstable,” Sebring said. 

After that conversation, Sebring’s communications with Corpus lessened, he said. 

Weeks later, Aenlle went to Sebring’s office, shut the door and told him he didn’t appreciate how he handled the situation, he said. Aenlle raised his voice and told Sebring he had evidence for accusing McAlpin, Sebring said.

Not long after, Sebring was transferred to work at the jail. He said he was disappointed and knew it was for helping McAlpin. 

Cooks brought up a social media account known for targeting Corpus. Sebring said he started following the account about a month ago, but doesn’t check it regularly. Whoever is running the account has a lot of important information, Sebring said. 

Cooks, during cross-examination, asked Sebring about his time working in law enforcement. 

Cooks asked if he supports it, to which Sebring said he just follows the account, nothing more.

3:30 p.m. — Sgt. Joe Fava, who was recently placed on leave, was the next to testify. Fava was placed on leave after the Post printed a story in which he said Corpus delayed and interfered with investigations into her employees, according to Little’s report.

4:00 p.m. — Fava testified about three internal affairs investigations that were delayed due to Corpus and Perea not taking action.  

The three investigations were when a correctional officer strangled an inmate, a teenager was vaping in the passenger seat and two correctional officers made an inmate dance provocatively.

One of the deputies involved was later named as sergeant of the year, Fava said.

During cross-examination, Ulrich said Sgt. Jimmy Chan is in charge of one of the investigations. Ulrich asked if Fava was blaming Corpus for delaying the investigation even though Chan has until Aug. 29 to turn in a memo. But Fava said Ulrich was misinterpreting the process.

4:30 p.m. — Ulrich asked if Fava knew how Sergeant of the Year honorees are picked. Fava said no. Ulrich asked if he knew a deputy working in the courtroom was named Sergeant of the Year. The deputy shook his head in disagreement. 

Ulrich later corrected himself and said the deputy was not named sergeant of the year. 

Ulrich asked if Fava recalls meeting him, but Emerson stopped him because it was as if Ulrich was testifying. 

“Do you want to take the witness stand?” Emerson asked Ulrich. 

Ulrich asked Fava if he had ever leaked any information, to which Fava said he found the question “extremely disturbing” because it was the first time he had to defend himself from that allegation. 

Lt. Dan Reynolds was the next to testify. Reynolds was the one to inform Sgt. Chan he was going to be transferred to the San Francisco International Airport at Undersheriff Perea’s request. Chan was transferred within hours of participating in a press conference in support of Measure A, the report states. 

FINAL 5:15 p.m. — Reynolds said that there is mismanagement in the sheriff’s office because of Corpus and Perea failing to take action on internal affairs investigations. It was Reynolds’s job to oversee internal affairs investigations at the time, he said. 

There were 38 cases waiting on Corpus’s decision since he requested to be transferred, Reynolds said. 

The mismanagement “erodes public trust,” Reynolds said. 

There have been many occasions when Reynolds has asked Perea on who will contact local agencies to follow up on some of these investigations but Perea would always say there was a lot more to it and “it’s not a quick matter,” Reynolds said. 

In his opinion, it was a “straightforward task,” Reynolds said.  

When Reynolds had to tell Chan he was being transferred, he was disappointed with the decision, he said. Reynolds knew it was Corpus who made that decision because only she was allowed to make that kind of move, he said. 

Reynolds was also ordered to place Fava on leave, to which he said it didn’t align with his values, leading him to request being transferred out of the internal affairs department. 

Cross-examination of Reynolds from Corpus’s legal team will start on Monday.