Mr K Otmane v Crowe U.K. LLP — 2021

The claimant presented his ET1 on 1 October 2019. The judgment records that he ticked race, disability, sex, sexual orientation and religion or belief discrimination, complained about sums allegedly not paid to him, and claimed unfair dismissal. A preliminary hearing listed for 9 April 2021 was postponed and relisted for 30 April 2021 after the respondent's representative sought a postponement because she was committed to another hearing.

After that postponement correspondence, the claimant sent the tribunal emails on 1 and 13 April 2021 in abusive, racist, sexist and threatening terms. Judge Baty warned on 7 April 2021 that such language was unacceptable and could lead to strikeout. The respondent then wrote on 5 May 2021 setting out further alleged offensive voicemail and email communications to the respondent, its employees and its solicitor. The tribunal later found that those allegations were made out, drawing support from contemporaneous evidence and from the claimant's refusal to deny them.

The claimant did not request a hearing in response to the strikeout warning. An email sent on 20 May 2021 in the name of 'Mehmet' did not deny the respondent's allegations and referred to CPTSD, but no medical evidence was produced showing that any condition caused or contributed to the abusive communications. The claimant made further representations on 24, 30 and 31 July 2021, including medical letters and arguments about unfairness and disability, but he still did not address the abusive communications or give any assurance that they would not recur.

Applying Rule 37 of the Employment Tribunals Rules of Procedure 2013, Judge Baty held that the claimant had been given a reasonable opportunity to make representations and that the proceedings had been conducted in a scandalous, unreasonable and vexatious way. He also held that there was no longer a fair hearing because the claimant's conduct towards the tribunal, the respondent, its witnesses and its representative was likely to continue. The claim was struck out in its entirety on all three grounds, and no monetary award was made.