Manager sacked for ‘grrrreat shag’ email

Only a joke, m'lud

By Linda Harrison • Get more from this author

Posted in Business, 1st June 2001 14:04 GMT

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A British recruitment manager has lost his case for unfair dismissal after being sacked for an email in which he called a colleague a "great shag".

John Crook sent the email in response to his operations manager Angela Brunton asking why he had recommended an employee for a pay rise.

The 37-year-old said his reasons were that the woman in question had worked hard and had an excellent recruitment rate.

"She was a grrrrrrrrrrrreat shag as well," he added.

Brunton's PA saw the email and made a complaint, and Crook was dismissed for gross misconduct from his £24,500-a-year job.

Crook said he felt he knew Brunton well enough to make the remark, which was meant to be in jest. He yesterday told a tribunal at Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk: "It was the kind of exchange of dialogue to which I had been accustomed."

To try and back this up, Crook came up with a list of Brunton's alleged escapades.

He claimed Brunton had once kissed him "amorously" in a hotel bar, while on another occasion she had straddled a half-naked male colleague as he lay on a hotel bed, and had then proceeded to shave his chin. He also said he had seen her french-kissing a female manager.

Brunton denied the two kissing incidents took place.

The tribunal rejected Crook's unfair dismissal claim, saying the email comment was not fitting to someone in his position as a manager. ®