Husband lost his job. His fault but he had good intentions. We are both deeply upset. Please help.

[user1471433754]

My husband's boss phoned him a fortnight ago, and told him to stand down and to hand his laptop in to HQ the following day. My husband was so shocked, we didn't know what was happening. We were in a distressed state as he's contract and won't get paid either.
After over a week, of not sleeping, eating, desperately worried, we received a very aggressive lawyers letter from the company. It accused him of downloading documents to his private e mail to read. Husband did do this, they weren't sensitive but he did do it so he could read them at night, and deleted them right after. He honestly didn't realise he was doing wrong. He was doing his best to help his team and get the work done. He's always known for getting jobs done and been told he's a great asset.
Back story to this is, I've been very ill the last year. I nearly died, also lots of illness on my part, mental breakdown, 2 operations, serious illness. He was trying to look after me and do his job at the same time in the evening. He's now been dismissed. Looks like we are going to have to pay both sides legal fees, but he has no job, I can't work. We speak to a lawyer tmro.
He has been foolish, but he did it with the best of intentions to get the work done. We are early sixties and so distressed, I'm worried he will have a heart attack. He's cried non stop, he is horrified, ashamed, embarrassed. Please be kind x

For anyone asking how they knew, most companies will have Data Loss Prevention, it means that sensitive data will alert when accessed and if access involves downloading or emailing to a unknown device. It's basic IT now and rules are getting stricter.

Data loss prevention safeguards a company from a personal data breach (fines from ICO) and also alerts to potential cyber hacks, since hackers look to extract sensitive data.

Also could come under Computer Misuse Act depending on what exactly he has done?

To claim New Style ESA if he’s eligible.

This, if you instruct a lawyer you’d need to pay your own legal fees but not theirs. Unless there’s a settlement agreement situation where the employer contributes to the employees costs, which seems unlikely here.

What other legal fees would they have to pay? He’s gone.

Sadly for your husband many companies are very very strict on this. Even if there is no commercially sensitive data they require company emails can only be accessed on company devices. If he’s a contractor and not an employee he will have even less rights.

The positive I guess with him being a contractor is he may be able to pick up something else soon.

I don't know the ins and outs of your case but I do work in an area related to employment law.

Have you got a copy of his original contract? It will give details about this sort of stuff. I'm thinking intellectual property and that they basically think he has downloaded company secrets in order to profit via his side gig? I might be barking up the wrong tree but it sounds like it if they are taking a case against him.

I will stand by him. Of course I will. But he just never thinks. He can be very naive that way. He's a clever man with the best of intentions and would never do anything to hurt anyone on purpose. Wouldn't even occur to him. He can be too trusting. It's the way he thinks 😞

Why didn't he use his laptop to read the emails at night? I have my work emails on my personal phone too with 2FA authentication so can use my phone too. Didn't he have this? Otherwise yes totally understand why he did it but that is a massive breach. Imagine if his personal emails got hacked? Hackers can gain access to internal servers etc by an email

It sounds like he downloaded confidential information, possibly business intelligence. I can't see why they would sue otherwise.
I have dealt with employees downloading company information before - they had to bring their hardware to work and have it deleted by the company but nothing further was done. As a contractor, they probably suspect he would pass it on to another company.

They aren’t going to be able to make you pay their legal fees. your own employment lawyer will tell you that.

Omg. What will this mean? I've been told it's civil and not criminal.

I'm wondering if OP's former employer is based in the UK re the legal fees stuff?

DH once turned down a contract after he'd been looking for ages and was pretty desperate for a job, because the company was based in the UAE and the contract stated that they could hold him to employment law in that country. He decided it was too high risk because if anything went wrong the law there was really punitive and totally sides with employers and could end up having to pay back really expensive training costs and stuff like that under the contract terms.

Come on OP, you know that this doesn’t make sense.

His reasons for downloading the emails were for an ulterior motive and it doesn’t help if he’s lying to you about this.
Its likely that the company feels he was trying to steal clients, rather than anything more sinister.

For now, are you claiming the highest amount of disability benefits you can?

Tell him to also put a claim in for UC and find another job asap, even if it’s not in the field he’s used to.

This sounds like a pack of lies OP.

What I think has actually happened is that your husband wanted the documents, either to use the templates or the data they contained, to use for his sideline or his next contract. Lots of contractors do this, but they’re not silly enough to do it in the way your husband has. He needs to be honest about this but no one is going to believe his story. It makes no sense. He could have read the documents on his work laptop at night. The only reason to do what he did is to use them for another purpose.

As a contractor, any documents he created, and any others, belong to the company. This will either be in his contract, or in the general terms and conditions of the company, which you agree to when working there either as an employee or a contractor. He will have known this.

Anyone who you tell this tale to, definitely a lawyer, is going to call bullshit. In future, if he wants documents, he needs to be smarter. I would not fight this, because it is clearly lies from your husband. He’s fucked up but telling more lies is only going to make it worse.

They don't need to 'look in semt items' these days and in fact never have, even back in the day email admins could see a record of every inbound and outbound email on the mail server. Now most companies have (or use third party) DLP (Data Loss Prevention) amd DSPM (Data Security Posture Management) software tools that monitor for company owned stuff going out (and dodgy emails coming in). These are generally based on Data classification though, as there's too much generally to inspect everything so they will be configured to flag for documents marked (or electronically tagged) sensitive or company confidential etc. I suspect this is what has happened here and it has also come to their attention that he has a sidel8ne business or website that is in their domain and so they suspect, or know, the 2 things are related.

Again, leave him and the lawyers to it and encourage him to get out of bed, update his CV and start looking for a new job/contract. Also ask to see a copy of the letter and take your own copy.

Is your husband on the autistic spectrum OP ? As the black and white thinking sounds rather like that. If so that might help with any explanations needed.

@user1471433754 I believe that YOU truly believe what your DH is telling you - but I have very strong vibes that HE isn't being 100% truthful in what he is telling you.

Now you've mentioned he has a side-line, connected with the paid work he was doing for his employer, it begins to make a lot more sense as to why lawyers are involved. It also makes more sense as to why he downloaded emails and documents from his work laptop to his personal laptop (so that he could use them for his 'sideline'.). I also strongly suspect that he absolutely knew that what he was doing was wrong and he would be in major trouble if he was found out.

Either way, doing something with the best of intentions, is never a legal defence to anything. I'm so sorry after all you have been through in the last year, you are now faced with this. As other posters have said, he needs to speak to the lawyer - and if you are up to it, I would advise you to go along too. It's your life, as well as his that's now on the line, financially and every other way too.

OP I truly, truly apologise for not reading the whole thread before posting (very rude) but it's just to say, if nobody else has yet: check your home insurance? We have legal cover on ours, and so do a lot of people (if you don't, anyone reading this, tick that box as it is not very much and provides you with a lot of cover!)

If he has it, that will cover the legal costs of this. And please check that the lawyer he is using is in the Legal 500 and Chambers and Partners, too? The best ones are. Lawyers vary quite wildly in skill level.

I would expect them to do two main things:

1. Terminate immediately and ask for company property back (which they’ve done)
2. Ask him to sign something saying that all company data has been deleted from any personal equipment and has not been distributed

If those things are done then it’s the end of the matter. I don’t see how he can possibly be liable for the legal fees involved in sending that letter and drafting the statement to be signed.

If he has somehow used confidential documents for his side gig and the contents have become public then it’s a different matter. They could demonstrate a loss and then there would be the potential for a civil case. But if he hasn’t done that then it sounds like the employers are worried that he might do it in future and so are trying to put the fear of God into him.

OP - if he really had just sent documents to himself and then fully deleted all the data then there’s really no prospect of them winning a civil case.

Hopefully your lawyer can give you reassurance on this, but in the meantime try not to panic. Legal letters are sometimes deliberately strongly worded in order to deter someone from doing something that the lawyers believe is a risk to the company.

On the subject of benefits (PIP/ESA), getting a fit note straight away and registering a claim now (before filling in the forms) can be important. If successful, payments may be backdated to one or other of these dates. Consider it for both of you. The same will eventually apply to attendance allowance once you reach state pension age. Also perhaps look at your NI records. You may be able to buy extra years (or check you have been credited accurately) to maximise your state pension. Even if your pension forecast says "You cannot improve this figure" that isn't always true. Future Pension should explain your personal options if you ring. They won't explain that even if you 'retire', you can register as self-employed and pay Voluntary Class 2 NI.

Exactky. most contractors like to keep their own templates, code snippets etc for future work, with no real bad intentions, but all will know that contractually anything produced whilst servicing that contract belong to the organisation contracting them for that service. So there are multiple ways employed to keep hold of things, if really desired for personal knowledge (or indeed if were doing corporate espionage) that are not detectable by the tools currently used. Emailing documents to self is well known to flag up, especially if its lots of documents over a short period. IT contractors, at least, have ways round this but increasingly companies are tightening up on data leakage even for 'best intentions' purposes like public service websites, so most dont really bother. I find it hard to believe your husband didnt know this. Still, lots have been caught out in the past. He needs ro own it and move on.

He’d follow company rules if that’s the case. He didn’t,

Ah yeah ok, it’s a lot of data and he’s a side line going on, had he even declared his conflict of interest ?

he needs to comply. If he does not they will take legal action to force it This doesn’t look good at all, and I’m afraid I think he’s trying to downplay it to you likely to lesson your worry, I’m also shocked he sent all the info to lawyers and didn’t even keep a copy so he could refer to it.

hes clearly sent a lot of propriety information to himself, has a work situation that is a conflict of interests and they need to confirm exactly where that data has been sent or used. If they find he has used it to benefit himself or it may cause them issues, he will face legal action, and yes if they win his employers maybe awarded costs.

its not good op and im not sure if i was them id believe he did it as he wanted to use his own lap top.

I think my focus would be on what the hell he did with this data, as it will come out.

No it was a lot of data and he’s has a conflict of interests, as such they will want to access his tech to see it’s been deleted and trace where it went. They are never going to take his word for it.

At your ages, does he financially need to be working?
Is there any way of you reframing this to him as a positive pushing slightly earlier retirement so that you have more quality time together? Especially given your recent health.
If need be he could find a part time lower paid job without the stress of that. Or can you downsize to make it affordable?

I could understand this level of stress if he was 40, but in early 60s try to put it behind you, you cant change it so let it play its course and minimise stressing

The to read in bed angle makes no sense, realistically it sounds like he was downloading stuff to help him on future contract work and sideline stuff.
when he’s out of bed you both need to properly read through the letter and he needs to be actually truthful with you about what he did (and why) and then come up with a plan. As currently you’re not exactly sure on the letter or what the fees are referring too