OSI HEARING: Should old acquaintance be forgot

A week ago today I had a hearing at the Office of Special Investigations. The Special Investigator was none other than Hayden Sands, the same guy that had rubber stamped Principal P.'s accusations against my colleague, Adila.

Back in 2006 I had written him a letter offering to serve as a witness in the case. He upheld the principal's version of the story without ever getting back to me. As far as I was concerned, he had shown bias against Adila, so I couldn't expect him to be fair toward me. I asked the union for another investigator, but they told me they don't get to pick the hearing officer.

Should I pretend that I never wrote him the letter? Now it was I who was biased against him. Would I be able to hide how much I distrusted him? Probably not.

As soon as we sat down, I said, "I made prior contact with you about another case. I want to bring this letter to your attention before we start."

He read the letter, and then said, "This was back in 2006. Were you a witness to this?"

"I was a witness to the fact that the bathrooms were locked for the first and last ten minutes of the period", I replied.

He didn't know what to say, and I didn't push it. I had another letter for him to read, which will appear in my next post.