Jimmy Davis Can’t Run From the Truth: The People Deserve to Know Who He Really Is

A court letter obtained through public records shows Bayonne Mayor Jimmy A. Davis asking the Hudson County Superior Court to adjourn his upcoming trial until after the November election — a move that would keep damaging testimony out of public view while voters are making up their minds. The September 22 filing, in Mathews v. City of Bayonne, et al. (HUD-L-1316-21), argues that running the trial during campaign season would be “impossible” for Davis (now a candidate for Hudson County Sheriff) and that jurors might be exposed to campaign coverage. The timing is plain: Davis seeks to delay a six-week trial beyond Election Day. (Public record: court filing dated Sept. 22, 2025, shown above.)

Voters should know this isn’t happening in a vacuum. Davis has spent years navigating credible allegations and litigation over a sexually charged culture around City Hall, including texting controversies that first erupted publicly in 2017. That year, Stacie Bera Percella, a former City Hall employee and longtime Davis acquaintance, publicly accused Davis of sending sexually explicit messages and filed charges alleging sexual harassment and a hostile work environment; the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reviewed the matter at the time, and local outlets published screenshots and video exhibits of the texts. 

Those accusations didn’t happen in isolation. Davis’s “sexting” controversy became a recurring theme in Hudson County politics for years, re-surfacing in subsequent elections and related litigation. In 2023, Bayonne settled two lawsuits with a former employee — litigation that, among other things, referenced sexually suggestive texts by Davis (for example, “I would eat you alive!!!!”), alleged to have been sent even after he became mayor; reporting traced the history of that dispute back to 2017. 

The drumbeat continued in 2019–2021 as additional claims about a sexually charged work environment reached court. Local reporting detailed lawsuits alleging City Hall was “a sexually-charged hostile work environment,” and a separate 2021 suit by then–Business Administrator Melissa Mathews alleged harassment/retaliation under LAD and CEPA (with multiple procedural rulings since). 

In 2025, a Hudson County jury unanimously awarded $500,000 to former City Hall employee Sincerrae Ross for a hostile work environment after a nearly six-week trial — precisely the kind of trial Davis is now striving to push beyond Election Day. Days later, a Superior Court judge vacated that verdict on a directed-verdict motion; Ross has appealed, keeping the underlying allegations in play and the public record active. Both facts are important: there was a jury award after a full trial, and then there was a post-trial ruling setting it aside — now on appeal. 

Even this year’s sheriff’s race has been shadowed by the “sexting” history: campaign communications from Davis’s opponent highlighted the old allegations and the city’s exposure to costly settlements, while Davis’s side tried to parry by attacking a rival spokesman’s past comments about the case — a reminder that Davis’s texting and sexual-harassment controversies have never truly left the stage. 

Layer onto that the still-pending Mathews litigation — which has expanded to cover land-use favoritism claims and other alleged retaliation — and the through-line is clear: years of litigation and allegations about workplace culture, power, and accountability in Bayonne government under Davis. 

All of this context matters when assessing Davis’s latest maneuver. His lawyers now argue that a pre-election trial would expose jurors — who are also county voters — to campaign material and media, supposedly risking “interference.” But courts routinely manage such concerns with voir dire and clear instructions; campaigns don’t pause the justice system. Meanwhile, the public’s right to hear sworn testimony before voting is paramount. (Public record: Sept. 22, 2025 adjournment letter in Mathews v. City of Bayonne.)

We can’t pretend this request exists apart from Davis’s history. From on-the-record texting controversies and sexual-harassment allegations that triggered investigations and settlements, to a 2025 jury’s hostile-environment finding later vacated (and now on appeal), the pattern is that uncomfortable facts keep emerging — and the price is borne by the public. 

The bottom line is simple: pushing this trial into January would shield a career politician with a long, documented trail of sexual-harassment controversies from real-time accountability. Hudson County voters deserve the full record before they cast ballots — not months later, after the court calendar has been gamed to one man’s political advantage. We’re confident the court will deny the adjournment and allow the trial to proceed, so the public can finally hear, under oath, exactly who Jimmy Davis is. (Public record: Mathews adjournment letter, Sept. 22, 2025.)