Employee exonerated of alleged off-duty misconduct
NYC Department of Corrections v Gayle, OATH Index #105/12
OATH Administrative Law Judge John B. Spooner recommended dismissal of a charge that a correction officer had caused more than $250 worth of damage to her former landlord’s property.
The landlord’s testimony that he saw the correction officer hitting the bathroom walls with a sledgehammer was uncorroborated and contradicted in part by evidence that the landlord himself had damaged the apartment.
The correction officer’s testimony that she had moved out of the apartment one month before the damage was incurred following alleged “improper actions by the landlord,” was corroborated by her sister’s testimony, date-stamped photographs showing the apartment in disarray, and the landlord’s admission that he had piled bolts of fabric inside the correction officer’s apartment and removed light bulbs because he was frustrated by her failure to pay rent and abrupt departure from the apartment.
The decision is posted on the Internet at: