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| Prison commissioner's use of discipline upheld |
| By Boston Globe |
| Published: 06/20/2005 |
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In a high-stakes showdown with the state prison officers union, the Mass. Correction Department commissioner has won a crucial court ruling that confirms her authority to discipline a union official in a dispute over the chain of command at Concord state prison. In his May 23 ruling, Superior Court Judge Ralph D. Gants approved Commissioner Kathleen M. Dennehy's disciplining of Officer Robert Grocki, a union steward, who on Jan. 12 disputed the right of a captain to order extra personnel to a section of the prison. According to the reports of two captains, Grocki used expletives in calling a captain ''a no-good management boy" and threatened to ''close this place down." Grocki also was accused of leaving his post without permission. Grocki last week said the statements attributed to him were ''less than the truth." He said he was a scapegoat for the administration. ''They want to send a message -- that's what's going on," he said. After the incident, Dennehy transferred Grocki from MCI-Concord to the Cedar Junction prison in Walpole; and the Massachusetts Correction Officers Federated Union, which represents some 4,000 guards statewide, filed suit. Steven Kenneway, the union president, had argued that Grocki singled him out for punishment because of his union activities. In an interview yesterday, Kenneway said the union would appeal Gants' ruling. ''We are taking this as far as we can," said Kenneway. ''The administration is trying to break the union at Concord because they think it is too strong." Dennehy, who has clashed with the union repeatedly since becoming commissioner last year, said yesterday that the case had nothing to do with union activities. ''The union says I'm union-busting, but I would characterize it as 'culture-busting,' " she said. ''This is about maintaining the safety and security of prisons. If the decision went the other way, it would clearly have diminished the authority of the commissioner." Gants, after conducting a hearing, ruled that Grocki's conduct was ''so abusive and disrespectful" that it warranted discipline. He wrote that challenging Dennehy's choice of discipline would be perceived as ''judicial tolerance of insubordination" and would aggravate an ''already dangerous situation." He also took sharp issue with the culture among guards at the Concord prison, where a 2004 state investigative report found that dismissed priest John J. Geoghan was regularly harassed and physically abused by officers before he was killed in another prison, allegedly strangled by an inmate. Gants pointed out in his 18-page ruling that Dennehy had said in an affidavit that officers at Concord ''regularly disregard the direct orders of their supervising officers," and that James Bender, deputy commissioner, had testified in the case that ''there is little respect for management at [Concord] among a core group of correction officers," who influence other officers. Gants said he believed managers who said there is ''widespread insubordination" at Concord. ''This is a remarkable statement for these [corrections] officials to make, and this court doubts they make it lightly," Gants wrote. |
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''This is a remarkable statement for these [corrections] officials to make, and this court doubts they make it lightly," Gants wrote, i agreed with Gants.Cheap Flights Islamabad to Karachi