Tea Tree Gully Mayor Kevin Knight struck a female employee on the backside with rolled-up document, legal report finds
Lawyers have found the Tea Tree Gully mayor deliberately struck a female employee on the backside with rolled-up papers – but after standing down he says there’s an innocent explanation.
North & North East
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Tea Tree Gully Mayor Kevin Knight struck a female employee on the backside with a rolled-up document at the Modbury civic centre in early October, a legal report reveals.
Law firm Norman Waterhouse’s report, commissioned by the council,found Mr Knight breached the council’s code of conduct by deliberately striking the employee on October 2 last year.
It recommends the council ask Mr Knight to issue a written apology to the employee.
It comes as Mr Knight accepted the council’s request last week to take an indefinite leave of absence following an external investigation into his behaviour.
Elected members will consider the report’s findings at a council meeting on Tuesday, March 10.
The council has spent $16,000 investigating the code of conduct complaint, involving Mr Knight and the employee in the centre’s administration area sometime between 9am and 9.30am.
The complaint about the mayor’s conduct was lodged, on behalf of the employee, by a colleague.
Investigators were told Mr Knight struck the female staff member as he was leaving the Customer and Communications section – and could have avoided any contact.
However, Mr Knight has maintained he used the document in his hand to let the employee know he was there, and not to step back into him.
Mr Knight argued he could not have struck the employee “even gently” because of an injured left arm and shoulder, including a torn muscle, tendinitis and bursitis.
“This was a reflexive defensive action,” he told investigators.
“I have injured my left shoulder and arm, with the consequence that I was sensitive about any contact being made with my left shoulder/arm.”
However, the report finds: “I am not satisfied … that the hit to the employee’s bottom could not have occurred without shoulder movement, ie elbow and wrist movement only”.
It was a “deliberate hit and was definitely to the employee’s bottom”, the report reads.
The complainant told investigators she had heard a smacking sound and the report found the victim subsequently “appeared distressed and on the verge of tears … clenched (her) chest and was breathing heavily”.
The report says the victim was “stunned” and “froze” after the incident and needed to isolate herself, had to get her breath back and crouched down.
A second witness to the incident, who did not see the entire exchange but overheard sections of the interaction, told investigators the employee looked “mortified and distressed”, according to the report.
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Mr Knight said he was “chased down” immediately after the incident by the council’s chief executive officer, John Moyle, and a staff member, who told him: “We need to talk to you right now urgently in your office”.
“I had no idea what (the staff member) was talking about,” Mr Knight told investigators.
“(He) seemed quite agitated and aggressive.
“It is in my opinion the most vile, disgusting and malicious allegation I have ever seen.
“It is absolutely false.”
Mr Knight has been contacted for comment.