Marriage proposal to cleaning lady leads to major riot at Amsterdam pharmaceutical company

Commissioned by plasma pharmaceutical company Prothya, company detective Hoffmann started an investigation into an employee who was allegedly guilty of sexually transgressive behaviour. The operator, who works in the Formulation department, is said to have assaulted a cleaning lady on the shop floor. According to the detectives, the man visited her at the women’s dressing room, invited her to his home and proposed marriage. He would also have offered her money in exchange for sex, although this has not been confirmed by Hoffmann. The woman was not served by these advances and felt unsafe for a long time.

The woman reportedly reported the incident to one of the team leaders. He would not have acted appropriately and not seriously enough. His employer found out about the course of events and suspended him. The man would have acted in a “very incorrect and inappropriate manner” and did not comply with the rules of conduct at the time of the entire procedure. For example, he would have tried without consultation to get the cleaning lady to another department. That was unacceptable to the employer, because she was the victim of the whole situation.

Hoffmann’s research also revealed disturbing signals. For example, there were indications that the team leader had brokered a marriage between the cleaning lady and her attacker. He would also have said to another colleague that the cleaning lady is a ‘bitch’ and that she ‘plays games’. The team leader, who has been employed for 18 years this year, was then transferred to another department. This resulted in a business conflict. He called in sick.

The team leader hopes to regain his old position by going to court. His employer just doesn’t like that. The company also relies on Hoffmann’s research. He concluded that the cleaning lady’s statement was ‘consistent’. It could be tested on various points because other employees could confirm her statement.

The team leader states that Hoffmann’s report is ‘wrongly’ assumed. He would have made a statement ‘under pressure’ and would never have approved it. He states that he ‘acted carefully’ with regard to the incident, because he was never formally reported for undesirable behaviour. The cleaning lady would only have complained to him about the difficult cooperation with her attacker. In addition, the team leader is not the direct manager of the cleaning lady.

All in all, the team leader thinks he should get his job back. The court agrees. After all, it ‘cannot be determined with sufficient certainty’ that he actually received a report of undesirable behaviour. Prothya has made ‘insufficient plausibility’ that there are reasonable and sufficiently weighty grounds for putting the team leader on hold. The judge also takes into account that he has ‘a flawless employment of 18 years with Prothya’. It is also important that the team leader was not heard about the contents of Hoffmann’s report after it was published. As a result, he was not given the opportunity to make his position clear, the court ruled.

In addition to getting his position back, the team leader is also paid back wages. He also does not have to pay the legal costs. It is not clear from the verdict what happened to the alleged attacker at the company.