[quote ItsLittoralViolins]@Personwithrage, thanks, that's my inference too. The tweets should be judged 'objectively' against the Code of Conduct (or bearing in mind the Code of Conduct at the very least).[/quote]
It's kind of both, I suspect. It's a multistage process. You'll see references to stage one and stage two. Stage one is a factual stage - were these things which are alledged done. Stage two is misconduct, impairment and sanction - has he breached the code and, if he has, what do we do about it.
It will depend a bit on how the lawyers argue it. But this is what I would expect.
First off, it will be decided whether, as a matter of fact, the tweets were objectively inappropriate, threatening, etc. Depending on what the charges say. I would expect the tweets to speak for themselves, here. Having your personal details and work address published, for example, is no more or less threatening because of the profession of the person publishing them. There are some times when it might be more threatening (if a known arsonist threatens to burn your house down then that's more threatening than if a six year old does) but generally something is threatening or not, almost regardless of who utters it.
It's not impossible that the lawers may try and argue that some of the tweets, whilst not inherently inappropriate, became so because they were posted by a doctor. Or they might simply argue they were inappropriate full stop. Hard to know without being there. But, in either event, it's really a factual decision about what he did,
If it is decided the facts are proved, the next decision will be 'does posting these threatening tweets amount to misconduct?'. That's where the code of conduct comes in. Misconduct is defined as a serious departure from standards which would be considered deplorable by members of the profession. That's a judgement call which the panel will have to make, and they make it in reference both to published standards but also the expectations of the profession.
If it is decided that the facts found proved were misconduct, then the next stage is deciding if his fitness to practice is currently impaired by his misconduct. Misconduct was what happened then. Impairment is the situation now.
Then the final decision is what to do about it. That's sanction.
To go back to my cake analogy:
Findings of fact are, "Last month, someone bought a yummy cake into work and you ate six slices."
Misconduct is "Eating six slices of yummy cake is a bad thing to do. It will make you fat and deprive other people of yummy cake. Your colleages would be shocked to know you vanished the cake!"
Impairment comes in two forms. It's either "If another yummy cake appears in the staff room today, are you at risk of scoffing the lot?" This is where insight and remorse comes in. If the penny has dropped that eating all the cake is inherently selfish, and leads to gastric distress, then you might be less likely to do so again.
Or it's "Scoffing all the cake was so wicked that, even though we are sure you won't do it again, we have to sanction you to make it clear to the rest of the office how unacceptable it is".
Sanction is "You are banned from the office to stop you eating the next cake."
Sorry, that's a lawyer's answer, using many words where only a few would do 