A former victim advocate who was fired after sending a reply email to the San Francisco district attorney asking, “What color are your panties?” is suing the county, claiming he was defamed and has been unable to find work since he hit send on the infamous email.
Jovan Thomas, 56, was fired on Jan. 26, shortly after sending the email that later circulated on social media. Screenshots of the email appeared to show Thomas making the inappropriate query in an office-wide email sent in response to a message from San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins.
Images of the email prompted Jenkins’ office to issue a statement to the San Francisco Chronicle clarifying that Jenkins had no relationship with Thomas and calling the message “misogynistic behavior” that violated the office’s code of conduct.
But according to the complaint, Thomas had no intention of sending the inappropriate email to his boss. Instead, Thomas says the message was intended for a fraternity friend, “who was distraught and grieving the death of his father.”
Thomas “intended to send his friend a humorous question of the type that Plaintiff had sent his friend on occasion in the past to cheer him up,” the complaint states. “In the context of their long-standing friendship, Plaintiff’s humorous question did not have any sexual, off-color, obscene, misogynistic or sexist meaning.”
San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins at a news conference in 2023.
(Godofredo A. Vásquez/Associated Press)
But according to the complaint, just before Thomas planned to send the text to his friend, he received a calendar invitation from Jenkins.
Instead of sending the message to his friend, Thomas hit “reply all” and sent the message not only to Jenkins, but to the entire staff at the district attorney’s office.
The complaint names Jenkins, the city and county of San Francisco, the district attorney's office and a spokesperson for the district attorney's office as defendants.
In the complaint, Thomas' attorney claims that office staff could not have interpreted the message in any way other than as an error.
“Absolutely no one who received Plaintiff’s email could have reasonably believed that Plaintiff had actually asked his boss, the San Francisco District Attorney, what color panties he was wearing, whether seriously or as a joke, much less in an email sent to all of Defendant SFDA’s staff,” the complaint states.
The district attorney's office declined to comment on the lawsuit. A spokesman for the San Francisco City Attorney's office said they would respond to the court.
Immediately after sending the message, Thomas sent another email to the entire office apologizing and trying to explain the error, according to the lawsuit.
“While texting with my fraternity brother, I sent a very inappropriate email,” the message read, according to a screenshot circulated on X. “I am truly sorry and would never do something like that on purpose.”
Later that day, Richard Ng, director of human resources for the district attorney's office, notified Thomas that he was being fired.
In the complaint, Thomas alleges that it was the district attorney's office that contacted members of the press, shared the email and also alerted reporters that Thomas had a prior sexual harassment complaint filed against him.
In 2018, Thomas was sued by a woman identified only as Jane Doe, who had been the victim of a robbery and met Thomas through the Bayview Victim Services office.
The woman accused Thomas of inviting her to his home, where they had sex. Thomas was later dismissed as a defendant and a judge found the county not liable.
In the complaint, Thomas’ attorney, R. Michael Lieberman, called the sexual harassment claim “baseless” but accused the district attorney’s office of pointing the complaint to reporters.
The lawsuit was first reported by the San Francisco Standard.
Reached by phone, Lieberman declined to comment on the case.
The complaint also claims the district attorney’s office failed to explain in its public statements that the email was a “strange email” sent in error, instead describing it as “misogynistic behavior.”
The statements made by the prosecutor's office, according to the complaint, made Thomas “the subject of defamation and ridicule.”
As a result, Thomas has been unable to find employment since he was fired, the lawsuit alleges.
