A Langley lawyer shall be suspended for 4 and a half months after admitting to expert misconduct that options sexual harassment, racist remarks and making a hostile work setting.
A listening to panel of the Laws Society of BC Tribunal chosen July 12 to easily settle for a joint submission from lawyer Rowan MacKenzie Davison and the other occasions involved inside the case. The selection was printed on the regulation society website remaining week.
There have been two separate citations in opposition to Davison containing 5 complete allegations. Collectively, they alleged that Davison had devoted misconduct between 2018 and 2021 by “making unwelcome remarks, taking part in undesirable contact of a sexual nature and making racist or discriminatory remarks to quite a lot of employees,” primarily based on a press launch from the regulation society.
Among the many many specific allegations detailed inside the decision had been two makes an try and kiss female subordinates, quite a lot of conditions of touching female employees’ clothes, and an event by which he requested one if she was sporting a bra.
He moreover referred to himself and others as “round-eyed of us,” whereas chatting with a gaggle that included a person of South Asian descent and knowledgeable two employees “to not lease any brown of us,” primarily based on the selection.
When questioned about this remaining remark, Davison knowledgeable the workers “phrases to the affect that he was ‘uninterested within the drama brown of us carry to the office,'” the selection reads.
Inside the joint submission, Davison acknowledged that his conduct was incorrect. He moreover submitted that the company had held a obligatory sensitivity teaching, appointed a human sources supervisor and drafted a “protection data” in response to the complaints about his conduct.
In a partial transcript of an interview between Davison and an investigator from the regulation society that was included inside the joint submission, the lawyer describes his conduct as “shameful” and says he has modified.
“We did do the sensitivity teaching and I, I can assure the regulation society that I’ve executed a whole about-face, a 180” the transcript reads. “Please don’t, nevertheless you’d focus on to any employees member and so they would possibly haven’t got something nevertheless glowing points to say about me.”
By deciding to easily settle for the joint submission, the panel moreover agreed to the proposed self-discipline it contained.
The panel ordered Davison to pay costs of $3,500 to the regulation society, and to serve a four-and-a-half-month suspension, which may begin on Aug. 16.
Davison will be subject to 2 conditions as quickly as his suspension ends. First, he can’t apply regulation besides he or the company for which he works has “a protection in place acceptable to the regulation society regarding sexual harassment and discriminatory behaviour.”
Second, he or his company ought to retain “an exterior lawyer acceptable to the Laws Society whose place it is to acquire and study any complaints in opposition to (him) related to sexual harassment or discriminatory behaviour.” That lawyer will report any substantiated complaints of such conduct to the regulation society following an investigation.