Threatening to start a mass murder in a factory justified dismissal

Release date: October 3, 2011

A welder with approximately 1½ months’ seniority challenges his dismissal. The employer accuses him of having said “that he would come to the factory with a 12-gage shotgun and shoot a couple of people”, adding that “it’s going to be the same as those who shot people in schools”. A few hours prior to uttering these threats, the employee had received a disciplinary notice regarding his unsatisfactory performance. According to the arbitrator, the fact that these extremely violent threats were directed indiscriminately at all employees and that they were uttered publicly in the presence of at least 6 people, including a foreman, could spread terror in a workplace. Having concluded that “the people working at the factory, taken as a whole, are not required to work wondering if one day the plaintiff might not “lose it” once again”, the arbitrator upheld the dismissal. T.C.A. Canada (FTQ) v. Alpha-Vico Inc., (T.A.) June 17 2010, Me Denis Provençal.


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