Metropolitan Police Commissioner and others v Eioyaccu EAT/0023/09
unfair dismissal | reasonable investigation | mental capacity
The Employment Appeal Tribunal (EAT) has held that an employer had not been required to investigate further the mental health of an employee whom it dismissed for gross misconduct.
Mr Eioyaccu was a police community support officer. In March 2005, Camden Council complained that he had introduced himself to a member of council staff as a police officer and said that aliens were beaming messages into the heads of residents via satellite dishes. He had asked for the dishes to be removed. The officer investigating this incident formed a view that Mr Eioyaccu was affected by “mental health issues”. However, the conclusion of his referral to the occupational health service was that he had “a few eccentricities” but was not suffering from mental or physical ill health. He did not attend a psychiatrist’s appointment for which he was referred.
There were further incidents involving Mr Eioyaccu that resulted in no formal action. On 31 May 2007 the manageress of a clothing store made a complaint that he had entered the store and acted in a lewd and inappropriate manner towards her and other female staff. He was suspended on full pay. There followed a complaint from an assistant of another shop that he had frequently visited the shop and behaved in a way described as “sleazy” towards female staff. Mr Eioyaccu declined an occupational health referral, saying that he was in good health. In the disciplinary investigation, Mr Eioyaccu denied the allegations and also voiced his suspicions that there was a secret society, linked to stonemasons, in the area. He wrote a letter complaining that this and an earlier investigation had fallen short of the standards of fictional characters of Edgar Allan Poe. The HR practice manager who carried out the investigation judged that he was affected by some form of personality disorder but as he had dismissed as unnecessary two earlier attempts to refer him to occupational health, there was no alternative but to take disciplinary action. He was dismissed for gross misconduct on 19 November 2007. One of the complainants was called Ms Pinero and in his appeal letter Mr Eioyaccu argued that the whole episode was designed by someone from the police station as a play in the style of Arthur Wing Pinero. In the course of an investigation into a grievance he raised in the meantime, he rejected remarks from the investigating inspector that he was paranoid and should consult a doctor. Mr Eioyaccu did not attend the appeal, which was dismissed.
Mr Eioyaccu’s unfair dismissal claim was upheld, although claims of discrimination and victimisation were not. The employment tribunal held that, among other matters, the Metropolitan Police had failed to take reasonable steps to establish Mr Eioyaccu’s state of mind at the time of the alleged misconduct and that it had not considered whether or not to suspend him medically. The Metropolitan Police appealed, arguing that the tribunal had substituted its own standards of what it would have done during the investigation for the standards of a reasonable employer. The crucial issue was whether or not the misconduct was committed, rather than Mr Eioyaccu’s mental capacity. Previous attempts to refer Mr Eioyaccu to occupational health or for psychiatric evaluation had either failed or led to no further action.
The EAT agreed. It held that the tribunal had “stepped into the shoes of the employer”. The employer was entitled to conclude that serious misconduct, namely sexual harassment, had taken place by an employee in a responsible and high profile position, and it did not need to explore further Mr Eioyaccu’s mental health. The appeal was allowed. Even if the EAT was wrong about the tribunal decision on reasonable investigation, Mr Eioyaccu had contributed to his dismissal. Therefore, if the tribunal had been correct to find unfair dismissal, the compensatory award should have been reduced by 75%.
Case transcript of Metropolitan Police Commissioner and others v Eioyaccu (Microsoft Word format, 69K) (on the EAT website)
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