Opinion ID: 695086
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: the removal effective 9 february 1993

Text: 12 Cooper was removed from federal service after Jackson leveled two additional charges against him, and Dan Causey, Jr. (Causey), Associate Technical Director for Engineering and Acquisition, sustained the charges. See Notice of Proposed Removal, 4 Dec. 1992, and Notice of Decision--Removal, 8 Feb. 1993, respectively. Specifically, Causey sustained the charges of being AWOL and making false statements to a supervisor.
13 Cooper does not deny that he was absent without leave on 16 October 1992 for eight hours.
14 On 16 October 1992, Cooper told his supervisor, Jackson, that he intended to come to work. He did not, however, show up. In fact, the Board found that Cooper had traveled in a direction away from his place of work. Jackson thus charged Cooper not only with being AWOL for that day, but also with making false statements to a supervisor. 15 Cooper had an assignment due on 16 October 1992. Substantial evidence in the record supports the notion that he had a habit of calling in sick or requesting last-minute leave on days when he had a project due. Substantial evidence also supports the charge that Cooper was lying to Jackson on 16 October when he told Jackson that he would come to work. 16 On 19 October 1992, Jackson found out that Cooper had sent his assignment in by facsimile at 5:05 p.m. on 16 October 1992. Contrary to what Cooper had told Jackson, the facsimile indicated that it had been sent from Bel Air, Maryland, bolstering both the AWOL and falsification charges. 17
18 Cooper challenges the adequacy of the notice that he received concerning the sustained charges. A federal employee cannot be removed from federal service based on charges that are not raised in the notice of proposed adverse action given to the employee by the agency. 5 U.S.C. Sec. 7513(b)(1) (1988). In other words, the Board cannot consider or sustain charges that are not found in the notice of a proposed adverse action. 19 Cooper contends that the removal notice does not contain statements relating to lies. Thus, he argues, the notice of proposed removal did not adequately put him on notice of the charges against him. We find these arguments to be without merit. 20 A Notice of Proposed Removal, dated 4 December 1992, from Jackson, preceded the removal effective 9 February 1993. Cooper's hypercritical reading of that Notice is unjustified. The Notice clearly states the charges: being AWOL and making false statements to a supervisor. It then states, in effect, Cooper told Jackson A when the truth was B. The Notice thereby states the specific reasons in sufficient detail to allow Cooper to make an informed reply. In was not necessary for Jackson to go on to specifically state, Thus, Cooper made a false statement to Jackson. When a conclusion is so clearly implied from the preceding statements, the Notice need not expressly state that conclusion. 21 Additionally, Causey twice extended the time given to Cooper for replying to the Notice; rather than seven days, he was given forty-three days to reply. Cooper could have cleared up any ambiguities during that time. This is particularly true since Causey logged over eighteen hours of discussions with Cooper during the forty-three-day period. Also, Causey accepted documents from Cooper through 26 January 1993--fifty-four calendar days after the Notice date. 22
23 Cooper asserts that an improper ex parte meeting took place on or about 8 December 1992. Apparently the following people attended that meeting: Causey (the deciding official), Jackson (Cooper's supervisor and the proposing official), Sam Shelton (Shelton) (an agency labor counselor), and Verda Sullivan (Sullivan) (a technical representative of Management-Employee Relations). 24 Improper ex parte communications with the agency official who makes the final determination concerning a proposed adverse action may provide grounds to overturn a decision. The other parties at the meeting must have sought to improperly influence the deciding official to remove the petitioner. See, e.g., Sullivan v. Department of Navy, 720 F.2d 1266 (Fed.Cir.1983). 25 We do not believe that any improper ex parte meetings took place. In addition, as previously stated, Cooper, after receiving the 4 December 1992 Notice of Proposed Removal, had at least ten ex parte meetings with Causey spanning more than eighteen hours. We have considered these ex parte meetings between Cooper and Causey while considering the effect of the ex parte meeting of Causey, Jackson, Shelton, and Sullivan. We conclude that this latter ex parte meeting does not provide a basis for overturning the Board's decision. 26
27 It is well established that the selection of a penalty for employee misconduct is left to the sound discretion of the agency. See, e.g., Washington v. Department of Army, 813 F.2d 390 (Fed.Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 985 (1987). We hold that the agency's removal of Cooper for being AWOL and lying to a supervisor was appropriate and not so unreasonable as to constitute an abuse of discretion, particularly in view of his prior problems. 1 See, e.g., id.; cf. Beverly v. United States Postal Service, 907 F.2d 136 (Fed.Cir.1990) (removal for one day of AWOL and for fraudulently claiming sick leave for that day).