Employees can be Validly Terminated for Having Sexual Intercourse Inside Company Premises

Employees who have sexual intercourse inside company premises can be validly terminated.

In the case of Imasen Philippine Manufacturing Corporation vs. Alcon and Papa (G.R. No. 194884, October 22, 2014), two employees were caught having sexual intercourse on the factory floor.

The employees involved in such case were hired as welders.

On October 5, 2002, Ramoncito Alcon and Joann Papa reported for work on the second shift – from 8:00 pm to 5:00 am of the following day. At around 12:40 am, Cyrus A. Altiche, Imasen’s security guard on duty, went to patrol and inspect the production plant’s premises. When Altiche reached Imasen’s Press Area, he heard the sound of a running industrial fan. Intending to turn the fan off, he followed the sound that led him to the plant’s “Tool and Die” section.

At the “Tool and Die” section, Altiche saw the respondents having sexual intercourse on the floor, using a piece of carton as mattress. Altiche immediately went back to the guard house and relayed what he saw to Danilo S. Ogana, another security guard on duty.

On Altiche’s request, Ogana made a follow-up inspection. Ogana went to the “Tool and Die” section and saw several employees, including the respondents, already leaving the area. He noticed, however, that Alcon picked up the carton that Altiche claimed the respondents used as mattress during their sexual act, and returned it to the place where the cartons were kept. Altiche then submitted a handwritten report of the incident to Imasen’s Finance and Administration Manager.

On October 14, 2002, Imasen issued the Alcon and Papa separate interoffice memoranda informing them of Altiche’s report on the October 5, 2002 incident and directing them to submit their individual explanation. The Alcon and Papa complied with the directive; they claimed that they were merely sleeping in the “Tool and Die” section at the time of the incident. They also claimed that other employees were near the area, making the commission of the act charged impossible.

On October 22, 2002, Imasen issued Alcon and Papa another interoffice memorandum directing them to appear at the formal hearing of the administrative charge against them. The hearing was conducted on October 30, 2002, presided by a mediator and attended by the representatives of Imasen, Alcon and Papa, Altiche and Ogana. Altiche and Ogana reiterated the narrations in Altiche’s handwritten report.

On December 4, 2002, Imasen issued Alcon and Papa separate interoffice memoranda terminating their services. It found them guilty of the act charged which it considered as “gross misconduct contrary to the existing policies, rules and regulations of the company.”

On December 5, 2002, Alcon and Papa filed before the LA the Complaint for illegal dismissal. They maintained their version of the incident.

The LA dismissed the respondents’ complaint for lack of merit. Alcon and Papa appealed to the NLRC but it was dismissed. However, on petition to the CA, the latter favored Alcon and Papa. Thus, the case reached the Supreme Court.

The SC ruled that Management’s right to dismiss an employee; serious misconduct as just cause for the dismissal.

The just causes for dismissing an employee are provided under Article 282 (now Article 297) of the Labor Code. Under Article 282(a), serious misconduct by the employee justifies the employer in terminating his or her employment.

Misconduct is defined as an improper or wrong conduct. It is a transgression of some established and definite rule of action, a forbidden act, a dereliction of duty, willful in character, and implies wrongful intent and not mere error in judgment. To constitute a valid cause for the dismissal within the text and meaning of Article 282 of the Labor Code, the employee’s misconduct must be serious, i.e., of such grave and aggravated character and not merely trivial or unimportant.

Additionally, the misconduct must be related to the performance of the employee’s duties showing him to be unfit to continue working for the employer. Further, and equally important and required, the act or conduct must have been performed with wrongful intent.

To summarize, for misconduct or improper behavior to be a just cause for dismissal, the following elements must concur: (a) the misconduct must be serious; (b) it must relate to the performance of the employee’s duties showing that the employee has become unfit to continue working for the employer; and (c) it must have been performed with wrongful intent.

Alcon and Papa’s infraction amounts to serious misconduct within the terms of Article 282 (now Article297) of the Labor Code justifying their dismissal.

Dismissal situations (on the ground of serious misconduct) involving sexual acts, particularly sexual intercourse committed by employees inside company premises and during workhours, are not usual violations and are not found in abundance under jurisprudence. Thus, in resolving the present petition, the SC viewed that it is largely guided by the principles it discussed above, as applied to the totality of the circumstances that surrounded the Alcon and Papa’s dismissal.

In other words, the SC viewed Alcon and Papa’s act from the prism of the elements that must concur for an act to constitute serious misconduct, analyzed and understood within the context of the overall circumstances of the case. In taking this approach, it is guided, too, by the jurisdictional limitations that a Rule 45 review of the CA’s Rule 65 decision in labor cases imposes on our discretion.

In addressing the situation the SC had to determine whether Imasen validly exercised its prerogative as employer to dismiss Alcon and Papa who, within company premises and during work hours, engaged in sexual intercourse.

The SC found the NLRC legally correct and well within its jurisdiction when it affirmed the validity of the respondents’ dismissal on the ground of serious misconduct.

Sexual acts and intimacies between two consenting adults belong, as a principled ideal, to the realm of purely private relations. Whether aroused by lust or inflamed by sincere affection, sexual acts should be carried out at such place, time and circumstance that, by the generally accepted norms of conduct, will not offend public decency nor disturb the generally held or accepted social morals. Under these parameters, sexual acts between two consenting adults do not have a place in the work environment.

Indisputably, Alcon and Papa engaged in sexual intercourse inside company premises and during work hours. These circumstances, by themselves, are already punishable misconduct. Added to these considerations, however, is the implication that Alcon and Papa did not only disregard company rules but flaunted their disregard in a manner that could reflect adversely on the status of ethics and morality in the company.

Additionally, Alcon and Papa engaged in sexual intercourse in an area where co-employees or other company personnel have ready and available access. Alcon and Papa likewise committed their act at a time when the employees were expected to be and had, in fact, been at their respective posts, and when they themselves were supposed to be, as all other employees had in fact been, working.

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Under these factual premises and in the context of legal parameters the SC considered Alcon and Papa’s misconduct to be of grave and aggravated character so that the company was justified in imposing the highest penalty available ― dismissal.

Their infraction transgressed the bounds of socially and morally accepted human public behavior, and at the same time showed brazen disregard for the respect that their employer expected of them as employees. By their misconduct, Alcon and Papa, in effect, issued an open invitation for others to commit the same infraction, with like disregard for their employer’s rules, for the respect owed to their employer, and for their co-employees’ sensitivities.

Taken together, these considerations reveal a depraved disposition that the Court cannot but consider as a valid cause for dismissal. In ruling, the SC considered the balancing between the Alcon and Papa’s tenurial rights and the company’s interests – the need to defend their management prerogative and to maintain as well a high standard of ethics and morality in the workplace. Unfortunately for Alcon and Papa, in this balancing under the circumstances of the case, the SC had to rule against their tenurial rights in favor of the employer’s management rights.

All told, Alcon and Papa’s misconduct, under the circumstances of this case, fell within the terms of Article 282 (now Article 297) of the Labor Code.