Three investigation mistakes that nearly cost this employer everything
On 19 February 2026, the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) issued a determination that should make every HR professional look twice at how they run workplace investigations.
Lionel Caffell had worked as an orderly at Christchurch Hospital for over 20 years when Health New Zealand (HNZ) summarily dismissed him on 4 October 2025. The trigger was a written complaint from a younger colleague alleging two physical incidents on 11 September 2025. The complainant alleged that Caffell had forcefully stabbed him in the chest with a pen and, later that day, punched him more than once, pushed him, and threatened to take him outside and beat him up. Bruising photos were submitted as evidence. Caffell maintained the whole thing was banter and playfighting. The complainant said he was fearful of working with Caffell again.
What followed is where the case gets instructive for HR.
Three colleagues were seated at open-plan workstations directly beside the incidents as they occurred. HNZ's investigator and decision maker, Evan Calder, spoke to all three and obtained written statements from two of them. Their accounts suggested the interaction looked like playfighting, or that nothing happened that required intervention. None of this was disclosed to Caffell before the dismissal decision was made.
Calder later said the omission was simply an oversight. The ERA was not persuaded, finding that it was a decision made based on what was "arguably a surprisingly poor investigative procedure, a more than minor fault, which arguably forms a case for unjustified dismissal."
HNZ also refused Caffell's request, made through his union representative, to speak with colleagues to support his case during the investigation. The ERA found this arguable as a further procedural failing and, together with the non-disclosure, considered it formed more than a minor fault in HNZ's process.
The CCTV footage created a separate problem. Calder watched the silent security recordings multiple times before concluding the conduct had crossed the line from playfighting. Caffell saw the same footage once, briefly, during the investigation meeting. He had been told he could request to view it on site beforehand, but there is nothing in the record to show that same opportunity was extended after the meeting, when the decision was still being formed.
Caffell also had no prior disciplinary history in more than 20 years of service.
Despite finding an arguable case for unjustified dismissal on procedural grounds, the ERA denied Caffell's application for interim reinstatement on 19 February 2026. The deciding factor had little to do with the original incidents.
After his dismissal, Caffell visited the hospital while drunk following leaving drinks at a nearby bar. In front of colleagues, he made abusive comments about Calder and reportedly threatened to burn his manager's house down. Caffell acknowledged in his evidence that he could not fully recall the conversation but accepted he may have said those things. The ERA noted, however, that the same threat had also appeared in the original written complaint filed before the investigation even began. The termination letter had already flagged that throughout the investigation meeting and the subsequent submissions, Caffell had "not once expressed that you are sorry."
The ERA found this conduct, combined with the ongoing management relationship with Calder, tipped the balance against returning Caffell to work in the interim. Substantive investigation meeting dates have since been set.
For people and culture leaders, the case crystallises a point that can easily get lost in a disciplinary process: gathering evidence is not the same as sharing it. When witness accounts are obtained but withheld, and when key evidence is reviewed extensively by the decision maker but barely by the employee, even a well-founded case can be left exposed.
