There can be no fact real or existing, no statement true, unless there be a sufficient reason, why it should be so and not otherwise.
Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Principle of Sufficient Reason
By Dr. Bob Uttl
When an employer sets out to target a professional, the most dangerous weapon in their arsenal isn’t a single, dramatic allegation of gross misconduct. It is the systematic accumulation of minor, trivial, inflated or outright manufactured charges, often retrospectively, designed to create a prejudicial shadow—a process colloquially known as “padding the file” or “sneaky HR tactic” in employment contexts.
Mr. Glen Dobie’s investigations provide several examples of such practice. Here we look at the Allegation #7 — one out of the 16 Allegations Mr. Dobie was tasked to investigate. The allegation in its entirety was:
Not reporting to your assigned school-related supervision duties.
William (Bill) Gook, Letter of Investigation, November 23, 2009
The Allegation #7 is about as vague, nonspecific as it can be. It does not say who made the allegation, when, on what basis, when and where did the alleged event happened, nothing, nada, nichts.
Following his investigation, Mr. Dobie concluded in his First Investigation December 16, 2009 Report that this indeed occurred, on September 9, 2009:
7. Not reporting to your assigned school-related supervision duties.
Conclusion: On one occasion this statement has been verified. It occurred on September 9, 2009.
Glenn Dobie’s First Investigation December 16, 2009 Report
In Conclusion section of his investigation report, Mr. Dobie boldly claimed that Ms. T was “culpable” with respect to this and several other allegations and that she should receive “a Letter of Direction.”
Stunningly, the space between the Allegation #7 and the conclusion is entirely blank. It reveals no facts, no reasoning, nothing at all about how and on what basis Mr. Dobie arrived to his conclusion.
For eight years, School District No. 5 kept Mr. Dobie’s First Investigation Report secret, did not disclose it to Ms. T, but disseminated it, secretly and ex parte, to, for example, the first psychologist Ms. T was forced to see, Dr. Todd Kettner (read Ms. Cynthia Stuart and School District No. 5: A 15-Year Record of Denials and Misrepresentations Exposed by Documents and Sworn Testimony).
When documents were finally disclosed and Mr. Glenn Dobie subjected to cross-examination, Allegation #7 reveals how a routine administrative error/lack of direction on the first day of school was transformed into a formal finding of Ms. T’s culpable conduct.
Yet, the very first necessary pre-condition of finding Ms. T non-compliant with anything was missing: Mr. Glenn Dobie failed to establish that Ms. T was assigned to supervision duties on that day and, if she was assigned, he failed to establish that she was informed about being assigned to the supervision duties on September 9, 2009.
The Charge: Missing Recess Duty on Day One
When Mr. Glenn Dobie interviewed Ms. T on December 7, 2009, she provided a straightforward explanation backed by physical evidence:
GLENN DOBIE: Do you recall missing any [supervision duties] in September?”
MS. T: It was the very first day. I was confused about the schedule on the wall. The schedule did not say that I was to be out at recess. I got yelled at for not being out at recess.
GLENN DOBIE: Did the school Principal [Karen Giles] talk to you and the entire staff about roles/responsibilities, etc?
MS. T: She handed out the same schedule and it didn’t say Ms. T at recess. It had other teachers listed.
Glenn Dobie’s Interview with Ms. T, December 7, 2009 (RBD/149-158)
Ms. T did not ask Mr. Dobie to simply take her word for it—she submitted a physical copy of the schedule handed out by management (Principal Karen Giles), proving her name had been omitted from the recess supervision roster.
Notably, Mr. Glenn Dobie was told 10 days prior and already knew that there “may have been a schedule change.”
The Corroborating Witness
On November 27, 2009, Mr. Glenn Dobie interviewed the co-worker who was on duty that day, Sandra Wales:
GLENN DOBIE: On September 9th, or there about, did she miss duty and leave you on your own for supervision?
SANDRA WALES: Yes.
GLENN DOBIE: Has it happened any time since then or was that a one time event?
SANDRA WALES: To the best of my knowledge, it was a one time event. There may have been a schedule change at that time.
Glenn Dobie’s Interview with Ms. Sandra Wales, November 27, 2009 (RBD/139)
The neutral witness corroborated two critical facts:
- It was an isolated, one-time event on the first day of school.
- There had likely been a schedule change at the time, directly confirming Ms. T’s account of the administrative confusion surrounding the duty roster.
Mr. Dobie’s Directive to Himself and His Failure to Follow It
Faced with a witness, Sandra Wales, telling Mr. Dobie about the schedule change, an investigator acting in good faith would immediately check management’s scheduling records and determine whether or not Ms. T was clearly informed about her alleged duty.
Mr. Glenn Dobie clearly understood this logic during or shortly after the interview of Ms. Wales. Written directly on his official interview record with Ms. Wales was the directive:
“Check to see if a change in schedule happened at the time.”
Glenn Dobie’s Note to Himself, Interview with Sandra Wales, November 27, 2009 (RBD/139)
This notation proves that Mr. Glenn Dobie actively recognized in real-time that a management schedule change or error would completely exonerate Ms. T of any culpable misconduct.
Did Mr. Glenn Dobie go and check the schedule himself? Mr. Dobie testified he did not:
QUESTION: Now, in your report, there was a misduty, allegedly, on September 9, 2009.And you have heard from several people you interviewed that there was a schedule change. And my question is, did you actually obtain a copy of that schedule to determine whether Ms. Tuson was actually scheduled for the duty on September 9?
GLENN DOBIE: No, I did not.
Cross-examination of Glenn Dobie
Mr. Glenn Dobie’s Direct Testimony: Isolating Act from Fault
Despite writing down a directive to check the schedule, receiving a physical copy of the flawed paper schedule from the teacher, and hearing another witness confirm a likely schedule change, Mr. Glenn Dobie never verified the schedule records, never examined the physical evidence.
When questioned under oath by SD5 counsel about Sandra Wales’s testimony, Mr. Glenn Dobie admitted his narrow, fault-blind mindset:
GLENN DOBIE: It was early in the investigation, and it was just a note that there was a recess duty that was missed and confirmed by another adult professional teacher in the building… So, it was just a confirmation that on this particular one day, a one-time supervision duty was missed.”
Direct Testimony of Mr. Glenn Dobie
Under direct questioning, Dobie confirmed that he treated the co-worker’s statement strictly as “confirmation” of physical absence, completely stripping away her crucial explanation that a schedule change had occurred. To Mr. Dobie, whether management handed out a flawed schedule was irrelevant—only the bare physical absence mattered.
The “Black Box” Summary
In his formal December 16, 2009 Report to Superintendent Bill Gook, Mr. Glenn Dobie recorded his final verdict while concealing all context and omitting all underlying evidence from his report. He did not summarize Ms. T’s explanation, he ignored his own handwritten note to check the schedule, he omitted the physical evidence of the flawed schedule, and he left out Sandra Wales’s testimony regarding the schedule change. He simply presented a bare, unreasoned conclusion: “Verified” culpable misconduct, even though he failed to establish duty was assigned or communicated.
Why Allegation #7 Matters: Administrative Bad Faith
Allegation #7 provides a textbook case study in how workplace investigations can be weaponized against an employee:
- Inverting Management Errors into Employee Misconduct: When administration hands out a schedule that fails to list a teacher’s name, the responsibility for the resulting mix-up rests with management. Framing an employee’s reliance on management’s own printed schedule on Day 1 of work as disciplinary non-compliance is administrative bad faith.
- Ignoring Exculpatory Leads: Mr. Glenn Dobie identified the key defense in his own handwriting (“Check to see if a change in schedule happened”), received witness confirmation for it, and then abandoned the inquiry to issue a finding of guilt anyway.
- The “Black Box” Reporting Method: By stripping out witness summaries, documentary proof, and analytical reasoning from his final report, Mr. Glenn Dobie created a document that concealed exculpatory evidence from decision-makers. A reader looking at the December 16 Report would assume a legitimate disciplinary violation occurred.
- Manufactured Disciplinary Weight: In standard labour practice,a Day 1 scheduling error is resolved with a brief 30-second conversation. Elevating a single “missed” recess duty on the first day of school into a formal investigative charge demonstrates a process designed not to find truth, but to pad a file.
Mr. Glenn Dobie’s handling of Allegation #7 fits a broader pattern: the investigation was not an objective search for facts, but exercise in targeted discipline. The facts were irrelevant to Mr. Dobie.