Canadian Employment Law Today

Canadian Employment Law Today | 3 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2015 Cases and Trends Employee fired after false accusation against co-worker Employee kept changing date and couldn't provide details of alleged knife incident with co-worker with whom he had past altercations By JEffrEy r. SmiTh An OnTAriO EmplOyEr had just cause to dismiss an employee who falsely claimed a co-worker threatened him, an ar- bitrator has ruled. Ihor Tropak was a stores clerk provid- ing materials and supplies to tradespeople for the University of Toronto. Starting in 2006, Tropak began having difficulties with other employees in his department. e difficulties began with an altercation with a co-worker in which a verbal argument escalated to the point where the co-worker pushed Tropak into a table. e co-worker was suspended and transferred, and other employees who were friends of the co- worker blamed Tropak. In December 2006, a new supervisor took over who was friends with the transferred co-worker and wasn't friendly to Tropak. Tropak had an altercation with another co-worker who accused Tropak of star- ing at him and threatened Tropak. When Tropak reported it to the supervisor, he was told to stay away from the area where the co-worker worked, including the wash- room. e co-worker had no restrictions placed on him and he continued to come to the stores area. In May 2012, the university removed the table and microwave oven in the stores area – where Tropak normally ate his lunch – in order to create more space. Tropak and oth- er stores employees were told they could eat their lunch in the trades area where the tradespeople had lunch, but Tropak wasn't happy about this because he didn't get along with some of the tradespeople. His concerns were borne out when he was often told all of the seats in the trades lunch area were reserved. On July 10, Tropak reported to the assis- tant manager that he tried to sit in an empty chair but a tradesman, Mark Ford, said he couldn't sit there. Ford walked towards Tropak, another employee intervened, and Tropak left the lunchroom. Ford admitted his behaviour and was told he couldn't ex- clude Tropak from the lunch table. Tropak also complained about his super- visors, whom he alleged were singling him out for data entry errors, scheduling per- formance meetings without prior warning, and calling meetings just before weekends or his vacation. He also felt the stores su- pervisor was getting even with him for his complaint about the co-worker who was transferred in 2006. e university investigated Tropak's complaints and dismissed the complaint against the stores supervisor, finding Tropak's desire to have the supervisor de- moted was not "in proportion with the al- legations that were made, even if they had been upheld." Employee accused co-worker of making threat On March 28, 2013, the union filed a com- plaint on Tropak's behalf in which Tropak claimed the same employee from the July 10 lunchroom incident, Mark Ford, en- countered Tropak in a stairwell during the week of March 15. Tropak reported that as he walked down the stairs towards Ford, Ford stopped and showed Tropak an eight- inch-long kitchen knife in his hand. Ac- cording to Tropak, Ford looked at the knife, then looked at Tropak. Tropak said he told a director on March 15 about the incident that had happened earlier that week, but he didn't initially report it because he felt no one would believe him and he would face reprisals. A few days later, Tropak said the incident actually occurred "in and around March 5" and he reported it to a director on March 8. e director to whom Tropak had claimed to report the incident said Ford and a couple of other employees had told him on March 8 that Tropak had been act- ing oddly at lunch the day before, walk- ing around wearing a hard hat, sunglasses and a paper towel around his face. When the director talked to Tropak, Tropak said the hard hat was borrowed for a project at home, he was wearing sunglasses because his hands were full, and the paper towel was on his shoulder, not his face. Tropak also said several employees were out to get him. At this time, Tropak mentioned an inci- dent with Ford "a week or so ago" and want- ed to file a formal complaint, but he didn't have all the details then. e director told him to get the details together and file the complaint, but Tropak didn't return. Since Tropak usually lodged complaints and re- quested investigations for work incidents, the director assumed it hadn't been serious. A meeting was scheduled and resched- uled twice, but each time Tropak didn't come into work. When Tropak was told he would be suspended if he didn't come into work, Tropak complied but reported trou- ble breathing and chest pains, so he went home sick. e university interviewed Ford, who de- nied threatening Tropak. Ford said he was on vacation from March 8 to 20 and was being unfairly accused. Tropak was inter- viewed and said the incident happened "the first week of March" after lunch one day, but didn't give a precise date. Tropak also said he told another employee but he didn't think that person wanted to get involved. Tropak also claimed he was concerned management was biased against him and nothing would be done if he reported the incident. He said he didn't return to the di- rector to discuss details because of a mis- communication which gave him the im- pression the director would speak to him. Failure to provide details University management was concerned about the vagueness of Tropak's complaint, especially the date. e date was important because in the union's official complaint, the date given was while Ford was on vacation. Tropak then changed the date so it fit with when Ford was at work. In addition, Tropak didn't provide many other details and his reasons for delaying making an official com- plaint were sketchy. Tropak had an estab- lished pattern of filing complaints and ask- ing for investigations for any issues, so the university felt if Ford had really threatened Tropak, the latter would have immediately complained to someone. Tropak was given an opportunity to tell his story in another meeting, but Tropak acted "guarded" and said little. It was de- cided Tropak had fabricated the accusation against Ford, which the university consid- ered gross misconduct and breach of trust. Tropak's employment was terminated on June 12, 2013. Following his termination, Tropak filed a report of injury for an acute reaction to the incident to the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) in which he DETAILS on page 7 »

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