The Racist, Pornographic Emails of a Contra Costa Athletic Director

The athletic director at West Contra Costa Unified School District sent hundreds of racist, sexist, and pornographic emails.

The next time you click forward on that borderline joke sent via email, make sure it isn't racist, sexist, or including pornography -- and make doubly sure you aren't a school district official.

"Numerous" emails containing graphic pornography and racist humor were shared by Matt Stewart, the district athletic director of West Contra Costa Unified School District, according to The East Bay Express.

Stewart was placed on leave by the school district after the emails were revealed. He began sending the emails from a personal account to school district co-workers and other coaches, teachers and athletic directors in the district -- some of whom are black or other racial minorities, like 85 percent of the school district's students, the newspaper reported.

As district athletic director, he is charged with overseeing the district's physical education program as well as interscholastic athletics, the newspaper reported.

Some emails compared Barack and Michelle Obama to apes and chimpanzees. Others compared Latino people to ET (the extra-terrestrial). The emails making jokes at black peoples' expense landed in the inbox of Clyde Byrd, who is the former athletic director and football coach at Kennedy High School -- and who is black.

"The thought that came through my head was: 'I'm in a school district that's predominantly minority and the district hired this guy to oversee the coaches?'" said Byrd, who added that Stewart "bullied him throughout his tenure," the newspaper reported. Byrd now believes that his ill treatment was a result of Stewart's now-obvious racism, the newspaper reported. "I've experienced racism before, but not where it's institutionalized like this," Byrd told the newspaper.

And then the pornography. Stewart regularly forwarded emails containing "hundreds" of pornographic images, including close-ups of female genitalia, the newspaper reported. A source who asked not to be named for fear of retribution estimated Stewart sent "more than 250" such emails, according to the newspaper.

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