Manager in foolish fake drugs prank was unfairly dismissed

The Employment Tribunal has ruled that a manager who spread sherbet on his desk to make it appear like drugs had been “foolish and insensitive” but did not deserve to be dismissed.

The case involved Mr D Buchholz, who worked for Geze UK Ltd, a company that supplies products, for door, window and safety technology.

On 28 February 2020, the company offices were undergoing a schedule deep clean by an outside contractor.

That evening one of the cleaning company’s managers noticed that Buchholz’s desk had a clear plastic bag containing white powder. There were two lines of loose powder and something that had been rolled into a “cylinder or straw-like” shape.

She showed the desk to operations director Mr Marshall, who said that “knowing Buchholz, it was probably a joke”. Another manager described it as Buchholz “playing silly sods”.

Marshall decided to lock the powder in a cupboard over the weekend. The following Monday, the police tested the powder and confirmed it was just sherbet powder.

When Buchholz returned to work after a week’s holiday, he found himself “locked out” of the IT system and facing an investigation by Mr Iredale from HR, which led to a disciplinary hearing on 13 March.

He was told that the items on his desk portrayed an illegal substance, which breached company policy because it could cause damage to its reputation and bring it into disrepute.

Buchholz said a colleague had brought in the sherbet and he spilled it, covering himself in white powder. This led to jokes and banter, so he decided to set out the fake drugs just to entertain his team. He had not meant to leave them there and had forgotten that the cleaners were coming in.

Iredale wrote to Buchholz a week later saying the company had decided to dismiss him because his prank risked damaging its reputation.

The Employment Tribunal ruled that the dismissal was unfair because there were no reasonable grounds for the conclusion Buchholz had left the items deliberately.

Dismissal was outside the range of reasonable responses to the offence.  There was also a failure to follow reasonable process, with Iredale acting both as investigating and disciplining manager.

Judge Connolly said: “In terms of the range of blameworthiness, this conduct is properly categorised as foolish, insensitive, careless and uncooperative. It would have merited some form of warning but not the loss of his job”.

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Mr D Buchholz and GEZE UK Limited
Employment Tribunal
March 2021
Judge Connolly