George Hopkins Charged with two Counts Sexual Assault

[garfield]

17 minutes ago, Icer said:

I'm not a labor lawyer, but my understanding is that allowing an employment contract to expire is the same as triggering severance.  Otherwise the contract would state "early termination" rather than severance.  So whether the contract was active or terminated should be irrelevant from that standpoint.

I never made the claim that the BoD was not aware of the severance until it was triggered.  What I said was the BoD (except for the executive committee) would not necessarily have been aware of the severance when they joined, and only became aware of it when the renegotiation started.  By then it was too late to do anything, which is how it would become serious leverage.  By the time the separation occurred, ever BoD member would have been aware of the clause in the original contract. 

As for the claims/counterclaims, the news reports specifically quote Doug Rutherford as saying there was no resignation.  I don't know on what basis he says that.  I also do not know if a press release which mentions "mutually agreeable" constitutes a legally binding step, who would be authorized to issue such a statement, etc.  Do you have a link to that document, because I don't think I have seen it.  And I still maintain that if crimes were committed of which the board were unaware, it may well be possible to terminate after the fact.  Again you would have to check with someone who understands the specifics of PA employment law.

http://www2.philly.com/philly/news/politics/george-hopkins-cadets-sexual-assault-drum-corps-allentown-20181113.html

Not sure if you're asking for this, but the claim is at the bottom of the article, and the claim is in Page 2, Sec III, pgh 9./

I don't have a copy of the "public announcement" referred to therein, but I do remember the announcement that they had accepted his resignation.

You make a good point of their acceptance may have been under duress of pending corps functions (the camp that weekend they did not want to spoil), but I'm not lawyerly enough to know if such a claim of duress holds merit.

 

[Tim K]

11 minutes ago, Icer said:

You are mistaken.  The board's job was to protect the organization, not an individual.  

You are correct but we are dealing with a situation where the director picked the board, made them nothing more than a rubber stamp, and as we know now thought he was the organization. 

[Jeff Ream]

14 minutes ago, Icer said:

You are mistaken.  The board's job was to protect the organization, not an individual.  When the anonymous claims surfaced, one of two things could be true: (a) the claims were accurate, in which case protecting an individual would be suicidal, or (b) the claims were false, in which case acting in error would have been fatal for the organization.  So the only thing that mattered was getting to the truth.  There was no obligation to be transparent with the public when, if the allegations turned out to be a hoax, a person's life could be ruined without justification.

You don't think the right law firm was hired to investigate the claims because the one that was hired already had familiarity with the organization?  OK, that's a point of fair debate.  But it doesn't mean that the objective of the investigation was anything other than trying to figure out what may or may not have happened 10-30 years earlier.

and they failed to protect the organization because by not allowing it to be investigated by non affiliated parties, it DID hurt the organization as shown in YEA's suit. I know for a fact bands fled to other circuits, and sponsors publicly stated they were pulling the plug as a result.

 

And given the boards history of inaction for any kind of control over the former director, I highly think anything they would do would be impartial because they were set up to protect the former director, because he had it set up that he was essentially the end all be all for the corporation. 

[Icer]

38 minutes ago, garfield said:

http://www2.philly.com/philly/news/politics/george-hopkins-cadets-sexual-assault-drum-corps-allentown-20181113.html

Not sure if you're asking for this, but the claim is at the bottom of the article, and the claim is in Page 2, Sec III, pgh 9./

I don't have a copy of the "public announcement" referred to therein, but I do remember the announcement that they had accepted his resignation.

You make a good point of their acceptance may have been under duress of pending corps functions (the camp that weekend they did not want to spoil), but I'm not lawyerly enough to know if such a claim of duress holds merit.

 

This is the only pubic statement that I have seen: https://yea.org/news/2003-statement-from-the-board-of-directors-of-youth-education-in-the-arts  

[Icer]

36 minutes ago, Jeff Ream said:

and they failed to protect the organization because by not allowing it to be investigated by non affiliated parties, it DID hurt the organization as shown in YEA's suit. I know for a fact bands fled to other circuits, and sponsors publicly stated they were pulling the plug as a result.

 

And given the boards history of inaction for any kind of control over the former director, I highly think anything they would do would be impartial because they were set up to protect the former director, because he had it set up that he was essentially the end all be all for the corporation. 

No one can know for sure, but it is my belief that the sponsors and bands that left would have done so merely because of what is alleged to have happened, not because of the mechanics of the initial investigation.  There are a lot of places to spend money, and you don't want your contribution to be tainted.  Remember, there have been no allegations of recent misconduct, so every act of which GH has been accused took place years before.  So whatever mis-steps may have been made in getting to the truth, it didn't change the allegations. 

And as for picking the board, I don't think you understand how nonprofits work.  Getting people to serve (especially when there are mandatory donations involved) is a challenge.  Obviously the both the CEO and the existing board are going to be the ones most heavily involved in the board recruiting process.  So that is not a convincing argument.

As for history of inaction or desire to protect the director, I suppose it is possible that for the one or two board members who may have had a close personal friendship with GH, there may have been a reflexive reaction in his favor.  But if you look at the people who made up the board at the time, they would be no more likely to have taken a bullet for GH than Doug Rutherford himself.  In fact, given that a bunch of the board never marched, they would be LESS likely.  When you get right down to it, the real inaction that had people upset up to April 4 was the board's unwillingness to address the deterioration in the Cadets' competitive results after 2013.  Remember - in 2011 when they won their last championship, all of the alleged abuses had already taken place, and as far as I can tell everyone in Cadetland was canonizing George.  The combination of the poor results and #MeToo created the environment where these allegations, which had been festering in the dark for decades, could finally come to the surface.

[garfield]

"Acknowledge"

In reading the reporting about the sequence of events, I find:

"In the suit, Hopkins says he resigned from the organization on April 5, the day the Inquirer published its investigation, and provided an April 10 letter from the then-chairman of the YEA board, Mike Kehoss, acknowledging Hopkins' resignation."

At this moment, the prior board had acknowledged GH's resignation.  Is "acknowledgment" in any way reflecting intent that the BoD agrees that this is a "mutually agreed upon cessation" of GH's employment under the terms of the severance agreement.

"Kehoss and the rest of the YEA board resigned the following day, amid growing backlash."

At this point there is no evidence of any agreement of recognition of a qualifying event according to the succession agreement.  The connotation that acceptance of delivery of a resignation document is, in itself, acknowledgement of a "mutually agreed-upon cessation" of employment is applied, not implied.  There is no agreement of a triggering event under the succession agreement.

Doug Rutherford had no evidence, according to reporting, of either a resignation or signed agreement of a BoD order he was to acknowledge so, at that moment when the reporter asked, his BoD had barely even taken control.  And, I don't get from reporting anything that would hint that the departing Board was warm and welcoming to the invading marauders (my term in fond fun) and, therefore, it's perfectly reasonable to believe that Doug was not told of any verbal agreement to a triggering event.

At that moment, the new Board had to act on their employee and were unaware of, and have yet been shown any evidence of, acknowledgement of any "mutually agreed cessation of employment from YEA!"  It was NOT agreed on and was, in fact, pending when the new BoD took over.  They acted and fired him, then they disagreed that it was a triggering event. 

I should be a lawyer or a fiction writer.

BTW, just curious.  Exactly what age was GH on Apr 5, 2018?  

 

[garfield]

4 minutes ago, Icer said:

No one can know for sure, but it is my belief that the sponsors and bands that left would have done so merely because of what is alleged to have happened, not because of the mechanics of the initial investigation.  There are a lot of places to spend money, and you don't want your contribution to be tainted.  Remember, there have been no allegations of recent misconduct, so every act of which GH has been accused took place years before.  So whatever mis-steps may have been made in getting to the truth, it didn't change the allegations. 

And as for picking the board, I don't think you understand how nonprofits work.  Getting people to serve (especially when there are mandatory donations involved) is a challenge.  Obviously the both the CEO and the existing board are going to be the ones most heavily involved in the board recruiting process.  So that is not a convincing argument.

As for history of inaction or desire to protect the director, I suppose it is possible that for the one or two board members who may have had a close personal friendship with GH, there may have been a reflexive reaction in his favor.  But if you look at the people who made up the board at the time, they would be no more likely to have taken a bullet for GH than Doug Rutherford himself.  In fact, given that a bunch of the board never marched, they would be LESS likely.  When you get right down to it, the real inaction that had people upset up to April 4 was the board's unwillingness to address the deterioration in the Cadets' competitive results after 2013.  Remember - in 2011 when they won their last championship, all of the alleged abuses had already taken place, and as far as I can tell everyone in Cadetland was canonizing George.  The combination of the poor results and #MeToo created the environment where these allegations, which had been festering in the dark for decades, could finally come to the surface.

This is really well-said, IMO.  And I think it's deeper, too.  The BoD had taken on a negative reputation because of GH's bull-headedness.  One piece of evidence is prohibiting his BoD from attending the Board Consortium meetings at the Janual.  At a time when the importance of Board governance is growing to represent the corps at DCI, Cadets' BoD didn't participate.

[Fran Haring]

11 minutes ago, garfield said:

BTW, just curious.  Exactly what age was GH on Apr 5, 2018?  

 

Please don't bring Medicare into this.

[Terri Schehr]

19 minutes ago, garfield said:

"Acknowledge"

In reading the reporting about the sequence of events, I find:

"In the suit, Hopkins says he resigned from the organization on April 5, the day the Inquirer published its investigation, and provided an April 10 letter from the then-chairman of the YEA board, Mike Kehoss, acknowledging Hopkins' resignation."

At this moment, the prior board had acknowledged GH's resignation.  Is "acknowledgment" in any way reflecting intent that the BoD agrees that this is a "mutually agreed upon cessation" of GH's employment under the terms of the severance agreement.

"Kehoss and the rest of the YEA board resigned the following day, amid growing backlash."

At this point there is no evidence of any agreement of recognition of a qualifying event according to the succession agreement.  The connotation that acceptance of delivery of a resignation document is, in itself, acknowledgement of a "mutually agreed-upon cessation" of employment is applied, not implied.  There is no agreement of a triggering event under the succession agreement.

Doug Rutherford had no evidence, according to reporting, of either a resignation or signed agreement of a BoD order he was to acknowledge so, at that moment when the reporter asked, his BoD had barely even taken control.  And, I don't get from reporting anything that would hint that the departing Board was warm and welcoming to the invading marauders (my term in fond fun) and, therefore, it's perfectly reasonable to believe that Doug was not told of any verbal agreement to a triggering event.

At that moment, the new Board had to act on their employee and were unaware of, and have yet been shown any evidence of, acknowledgement of any "mutually agreed cessation of employment from YEA!"  It was NOT agreed on and was, in fact, pending when the new BoD took over.  They acted and fired him, then they disagreed that it was a triggering event. 

I should be a lawyer or a fiction writer.

BTW, just curious.  Exactly what age was GH on Apr 5, 2018?  

 

61. 

[garfield]

3 minutes ago, Fran Haring said:

Please don't bring Medicare into this.

No, not that.  Another "triggering event" is GH retirement on or after age 62.  With any luck, on April 5th, 2018, he was months away from 62.

The only "triggering event" he could win on would be "disability", but only if it included total mental disability.