Canadian Employment Law Today | 3
Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2017
Cases and Trends
Trumped-up charge of workplace assault
leads to unjust dismissal damages
Employer relied on victim's delayed incident report but didn't talk to
employee or consider several mitigating factors
BY JEFFREY R. SMITH
A MANITOBA First Nations band must
pay a former long-term employee $57,000
for unjust dismissal stemming from a poor
investigation of a dubious accusation of
workplace assault.
Nancy omas, 61, was hired in April
1995 by Shamattawa First Nation to be a
building healthy community co-ordinator.
Shamattawa was a First Nations community
located in a remote area in northern Mani-
toba, which was only reachable by tempo-
rary winter roads or airplane in the summer.
omas had lived in Shamattawa since 1966
after spending her early childhood in a resi-
dential school.
For many years, omas had her work di-
rectly assigned by the band's chief and coun-
cil and she worked as a counsellor and co-
ordinator in the community without regular
supervision. is changed in 2006, when the
position of health director was created and
omas was supervised by this individual,
who reported to the band manager.
omas didn't respond well to the change
in reporting structure, and both the health
director and band manager found she could
be unco-operative and aggressive with them
if they disapproved of her projects in the
community. Sometimes, she challenged
the band manager's authority. In July 2006
and August 2012, omas was given letters
warning her to conduct herself better. e
2012 letter described it as her second warn-
ing, though the first letter disappeared from
omas' file.
On July 8, 2015, the band manager saw
another employee rushing to help a child
who was pinned down by a fallen object in
the band office. He learned of an altercation
with that employee involving omas dur-
ing the incident and was told by the chief and
council to investigate.
e band manager spoke with various em-
ployees, and the one who had rushed to help
the child told him that when he tried to get
through a doorway to get to the child, om-
as pushed him against the wall with both
hands. Other employees reported seeing
omas and the co-worker in the same area.
e co-worker created an incident report on
July 19 after the chief and council kept asking
him about it, stating that as he walked past
omas and tried to move out of her way, she
moved herself past him and pushed him to-
ward the wall. e employee's report stated
VICTIM on page 7 ยป
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