MATAWAN - The borough and its insurer have paid more than $2 million over the last quarter-century to settle discrimination suits against the police department.

Now one Hispanic officer — who was paid $315,000 to settle her claims of race and sex discrimination — says the department has since retaliated with trumped-up disciplinary charges and a suspension.

Police Officer Jennifer Paglia's second lawsuit is the latest against this town of 8,810, a Bayshore community split between more recent commuter settlers and families with centuries-old ties to the land. Discrimination and retaliation suits against the department and borough from their first black chief, his civilian nephew, a disabled civilian dispatcher and now a Hispanic officer have all ended in six- and seven-figure payouts beginning in 1996.

Matawan was 82 percent white — slightly less than the county average of 84.5 percent — as of the last census. Seven percent was black or African-American and 10.8 percent Hispanic or Latino.

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The claims in the lawsuits, taken together, paint a picture of rampant discrimination and dysfunction within the department. The department and the borough have consistently denied any wrongdoing in their own court filings. Settlement agreements similarly make it clear that the borough does not admit wrongdoing.

Since 1996, the payouts have included:

$1 million to a disabled police dispatcher — and a promise to install a wheelchair lift — in a 1999 settlement after a jury had awarded him $2.25 million, contingent on a mutual agreement not to appeal.

$360,000 in 1996 to settle a 1995 lawsuit by the late James Alston, the borough's first black chief but then a detective sergeant, claiming he and his wife had been harassed and that the department had denied him work privileges.

Another $125,000 to Alston's nephew, who was told there was no police openings just weeks before two white officers were hired.

Back pay to the tune of $57,943 and $150,000 for "pain and suffering" to settle a second suit from Alston.

A $315,000 settlement in 2016 in a lawsuit filed by officer Jennifer Paglia, who claimed she was singled out for mistreatment by supervisors who wanted to block a Hispanic woman from advancing.

The payouts have been such a burden on the borough that in 1996, they were a major factor in a proposed budget that would have increased the town's property tax rate by 35 percent.

Thanks to the secretive nature of civil settlements it is difficult to put Matawan's payouts in context with towns of similar sizes.

Large settlements in small towns are not unheard of, though. Seaside Park, for example, with just 1,579 year-round residents, was subject to $5.5 million in settlements and awards between 2004 and 2013 in lawsuits that involved its police department. But there are comparatively larger towns that agree to fewer and smaller payouts as well.

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Several of the lawsuits against Matawan alleged that preferential treatment for or direct action by current Chief Thomas Falco and former Chief Jason Gallo were evidence of discrimination or retaliation.

Paglia filed the most recent lawsuit in Monmouth County Superior Court in October 2018. She claims that she was retaliated against after she received a settlement for an earlier discrimination lawsuit.

The borough quietly agreed to a $315,000 settlement, finalized in 2016, to end Paglia's discrimination lawsuit in which she claimed she was singled out for mistreatment because she is a Hispanic woman.

Paglia first sued Matawan in September 2013 after finding "sham memos" in her personnel file in July 2012, according to her complaint from that lawsuit. The memos dated back to 2004, when Jason Gallo, then a sergeant, became her supervisor, she claimed. Gallo and then-Sgt. Falco authored the memos, she claimed.

Gallo would become chief by the time she filed her lawsuit. Falco is currently chief. The lawyer who represented them and the borough denied in court filings that they had filed bogus paperwork.

"Gallo and Falco drafted these memos and placed them in (Paglia's) personnel file without her knowledge in an effort to prevent her from being promoted to sergeant, and thereby, to prevent a Hispanic female from being placed in a superior position in the Borough of Matawan Police Department," her 2013 complaint read. "The Borough of Matawan has never had a female in a superior position in the department."

Despite vacancies and Paglia's seniority and qualifications, the department never promoted her, which she claimed was only part of "a continuing pattern and practice of discriminatory treatment" she suffered at work.

In response to most of the allegations in Paglia's complaint, attorneys for the borough and individual defendants responded in court filings that they "neither admit nor deny the allegations as set forth … and defendants leave the plaintiff to her proofs."

Lawyers for the defendants did outright deny that Gallo or Falco had composed or filed false memos to stop Paglia's advancement, that she had been the victim of any pattern of discrimination or that she had been treated differently from her male colleagues.

They also denied that the borough, borough police or Falco or Gallo had violated anti-discrimination laws, discriminated against Paglia on account of her race or gender, inflicted harm against Paglia or had failed to promote her on illegitimate grounds.

Paglia and the borough settled in February 2016 as the case was scheduled to go to trial. Paglia got $315,000 from the borough and its insurance carrier, according to a settlement agreement obtained through an Open Public Records Act (OPRA) request.

The borough made no admission of wrongdoing in the agreement.

Falco, Gallo, Paglia and the borough also agreed to a non-disparagement clause.

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But according to Paglia's more recent lawsuit, she began experiencing retaliation in May 2016 in the form of several disciplinary notices and an unpaid suspension. She claimed the borough did not discipline her male colleagues "for the same or similar alleged offenses," according to her complaint.

In a court filing, the borough denied retaliating against Paglia or treating her male colleagues differently.

A history of discrimination suits

Falco and Gallo were tied to two other lawsuits that resulted in large settlements. One was from former Chief James Alston, Gallo's predecessor and the department's first black chief. The other was from Alston's nephew, Michael Butler, also black, who wanted to apply as an officer in 1992. A police supervisor told Butler there were no openings the day before hand-delivering an employment application to a white man, and just a few weeks before hiring two white officers, according to the lawsuit Alston filed in 1995.

Those white officers were Falco and Gallo.

Alston, then a 44-year-old detective sergeant, claimed the department discriminated and retaliated against him by downgrading his position and passing him over for promotion for trying to help his nephew get a job and later helping him file an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint, according to his lawsuit.

Butler settled for $125,000 in 1996. The borough made no admission of wrongdoing.

Alston's settlement the same year was even bigger: $360,000, approved by a majority of the borough council. The price tag was so divisive that then-Mayor Robert Shuey, a Republican, resigned in protest, maintaining that there had been no discrimination against Alston. At the same time borough Democrats seized the opportunity to break Republicans' grip on a council monopoly. They were able to win a single seat on the six-member board in the November 1996 election.

A third officer, Richard Wolak, also received an $83,000 award that year after suing the borough and then-Chief Carmen Messina. Wolak claimed his superiors had retaliated against him by denying him a promotion to sergeant after he spoke out against alleged violations of the borough council's promotions practices and misconduct by a fellow officer, according to his lawsuit.

A federal judge also awarded Wolak's lawyer $147,501 in legal fees.

Matawan's insurance carrier covered part of the borough's legal tab, but the burden on the borough's coffers was so great that, along with other rising expenses, the proposed budget for the next fiscal year carried a 35-percent tax rate increase.

Things cooled off for a few years — until, in May 1999, a jury awarded John Holden, a disabled police dispatcher, $2.25 million in a discrimination suit. In a bargain that forbade both Holden and the borough from appealing, Holden agreed to settle instead for a cool $1 million — $300,000 of which came directly from the borough, with its insurance carrier covering the rest. The borough also agreed to install a wheelchair lift at police headquarters.

Meanwhile Alston rose through the ranks.

The man who would be chief — and then not

In 2008, after 36 years on the force, Alston became the department's first black chief. "I have seen a lot of good things and my share of misery as a police officer," he told the Press at the time.

Alston's tenure as top cop was brief. In 2010 he was suspended with pay as the council investigated disciplinary charges against him and in 2011 he was demoted to lieutenant and suspended again, this time without pay, for 10 days. After another flurry of lawsuits he would regain the title of chief in 2012 — but only in exchange for his immediate retirement.

The firestorm escalated after an October 2009 confrontation between Alston and a convicted felon named Anthony Gray, though Alston had long endured racial and, later, age discrimination from the borough government, according to one of Alston's civil complaints.

Alston claimed he had gone to break up a large crowd on Orchard Street, a "high-crime section of the Borough known for gang-related activity," according to a civil complaint against the borough Alston filed in federal court. "Alston lives in the Borough. Therefore, even though he was off-duty, he reported to the area. He did so to protect the public and disperse the crowd, if need be. He was successful in doing so," his complaint read.

Gray remembered the encounter differently, at least according to a complaint he filed in 2011.

Gray had been walking along Orchard Street — on crutches since he had a broken leg — when "Alston pulled his vehicle up to a house in the neighborhood in a reckless fashion, nearly sideswiping a young man on a bicycle," according to Gray's complaint.

After exchanging words with the cyclist, Gray and others present, Alston ordered other officers who showed up to arrest Gray, which never ended up happening, according to the civil complaints. At one point, Alston "flicked a cigarette butt down (Gray's) shirt and burned him in an attempt to provoke (Gray)," according to Gray's complaint.

"Alston was intoxicated," according to Gray's complaint. "Alston was often intoxicated in public during police/citizen encounters."

In a court filing responded to Gray's complaint, the borough denied that any police officers who may have dealt with Gray that night were acting in an official capacity and also denied that any officers or borough officials had committed any wrongdoing.

Alston called Gray's allegations "false" in his own complaint.

"Alston, when he was a member of the Bayshore Narcotics Task Force, had arrested both Gray and Gray's father for narcotics and related offenses," according to Alston's complaint. "Gray, because of his animosity towards Alston and because he wanted money, filed a false complaint with the (Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office)."

Then-Lt. Gallo and another lieutenant, Benedict Smith, "made false and misleading statements about Alston and his conduct" to investigators from the prosecutor's office, Alston claimed. As a result he was stripped of his weapons — not only his duty guns, but his personal firearms as well — and put on paid leave. He also said the borough had filed bogus charges against him for allegedly traveling to Atlantic County on work days. He countered that he had not, in fact, been working those days.

In response to losing both his weapons and duty status, Alston sued both the borough that suspended him and the Monmouth County Prosecutor's Office, which had investigated him. The prosecutor's office denied any wrongdoing in court filings. So did the borough, which also denied that Alston had endured discrimination.

Alston got his guns back under the terms of his settlement with the prosecutor's office. His settlement with the township got him reinstated to chief, retroactive to October 2011 — along with back pay totaling $57,943.30, according to the settlement agreement. He also got a $150,000 payout for "pain and suffering," two thirds of which went to his lawyer.

And he agreed to retire.

Gray also settled with the borough — for a paltry $7,500, according to his settlement agreement.

Alston died in January.

Holden, the dispatcher, also died recently, in July 2018.

Silence from all sides

Falco and Paglia did not return messages requesting comment for this story, nor did Paglia's attorney, Paul Castronovo.

Borough Administrator Louis Ferrara deferred to the borough's attorneys.

Pasquale Menna, a Red Bank attorney who represents the borough, referred questions to Toms River attorney Stephen Secare, who has filed the borough's official court response to Paglia's most recent lawsuit.

Menna did say, however, that the borough administration's "intent is to fully litigate the issue since there are absolutely no merit in law or in fact to the complaint that has been filed by Officer Paglia and we will be defending and litigating all of the issues in court."

Secare said he "cannot comment beyond what's in the court documents."

Alex N. Gecan: @GeeksterTweets; 732-643-4043; agecan@gannettnj.com