Norfolk Southern Fires C.E.O. After Ethics Investigation

There are a couple of fascinating things about this stunning example of how true it is that “What Goes Around Comes Around!” To begin with this guy had worked at the company for 30 years, so he obviously knew the corporate rules of ethics and behavior, particularly the one against personal relationships among employees. Then to exacerbate the matter to certain calamity, the pair would travel together to various events that other execs were also attending. However, they would go together but apart from the others, as well as both stay in a different hotel from where the others were staying. In short, they blatantly and obviously flaunted the policies of the company they worked for. 

The result is that he’s been terminated from a job that paid him $13million last year. Then add lost stock options, projected bonus, his reputation and however he has damaged Ms. Nag’s reputation to the cost of those mindless actions, and it makes one’s head spin to wonder… What the heck was he thinking!!??! 

Well…it would seem that he wrongly considered himself to be safe from scrutiny due to his position in the company and what he delusionally considered his clever cover-up (NOT)! Clearly, he had come to believe that such matters as “Cause & Effect” might possibly be important for others to consider, but that he was somehow impervious to it. Apparently, he was not! Nor are any of us!

The railroad company’s board said it dismissed Alan Shaw and an executive he had a consensual relationship with.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/11/business/norfolk-southern-alan-shaw-ceo.html?smid=em-share

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New York CNN — 

Norfolk Southern CEO Alan Shaw was fired for cause by the railroad’s board for “engaging in a consensual relationship with the company’s chief legal officer,” who was also terminated, the railroad announced Wednesday evening.

A statement from the company on Wednesday said that Shaw had been dismissed “for cause,” which could prevent him from collecting the kind of exit package that CEOs often receive when shown the door.

The company originally disclosed that Shaw was the subject of an investigation on Sunday.

Shaw had been CEO of one of the nation’s four largest freight railroads for just over two years. But it had been a turbulent tenure that included contentious labor negotiations that nearly resulted in an economy-crippling strike, a major derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, that released tank cars full of toxic materials into a small Ohio town, sparking health concerns and complaints about continuing symptoms by some residents, and a proxy fightwith an activist shareholder group who wanted Shaw replaced.

Shaw survived that shareholder vote, but could not survive the investigation into his personal behavior.

The company said Nabanita Nag has been terminated from her roles as executive vice president corporate affairs, chief legal officer and corporate secretary, effective immediately, in connection with the preliminary findings of the Board’s ongoing investigation. It announced it had picked CFO Mark George as the company’s new CEO.

“The Board has full confidence in Mark and his ability to continue delivering on our commitments to shareholders and other stakeholders,” said Claude Mongeau, chairman of the Norfolk Southern’s board.

The company’s statement contained no expression of thanks to Shaw for his 30 years with the company, nor any statement from Shaw, who could not immediately be reached for comment by CNN. Shaw joined the company in 1994 as a cost systems analyst and steadily moved into positions of increasing responsibility, according to his corporate official biography.

While the railroad’s powerful Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen union, as well as the union representing workers who do track maintenance, opposed Shaw and Norfolk Southern management during its shareholder proxy fight earlier this year, other unions supported Shaw. And he received praise from some past critics of the railroads for steps he took after the February 2023 derailment in East Palestine to improve railroad safety.

During the proxy battle, Amit Bose, administrator of the Federal Railroad Administration, the nation’s rail regulator, wrote a letter praising the improvement in practices at the railroad under Shaw. He said the moves “are important and demonstrate the ability to make progress when railroads make safety a priority.” And he said that NS was the only Class I railroad to achieve significant reductions in the rate of mainline derailments last year.

Eventually shareholders decided to back Shaw, who was re-elected to the board with 64% of the votes cast. A majority of Norfolk’s slate of director candidates were also elected, although three candidates proposed by Ancora, the activist investor group that sought his ouster, won election to the board as well.

Still, Norfolk’s actions related to the derailment received harsh criticism from Jennifer Homendy, chair of the National Transportation Safety Board, which investigated the accident. She said Norfolk Southern’s actions following the derailment put first responders and neighbors of the derailment site at unnecessary risk. And she said Norfolk’s actions during the investigative process were “unprecedented and reprehensible.”

The NTSB probe found the cause of the derailment to be a failure of the axle of one car that sparked a fire and led to the derailment without sufficient warning to crew members to stop the train in time.

While NS’s actions leading up to the accident did not receive much criticism from the safety agency, its actions in the hours and days that followed received harsh criticism, especially the lack of information that was initially made available to first responders on the scene about the safety hazards they faced and for the decision to have a controlled burn of five tank cars full of vinyl chloride, a toxic chemical.

The burn occurred three days after the derailment, due to stated concerns that there could be an undisclosed explosion. But the NTSB probe found the conditions were unlikely to have caused such an explosion by that point, and that Norfolk Southern officials did not properly inform public officials of that as the decision was made to go ahead with the controlled burn.


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Norfolk Southern Fires C.E.O. After Ethics Investigation

Norfolk Southern Fires C.E.O. After Ethics Investigation

U.S. Coast Guard Academy, in New London, Connecticut between 1988 and 2006, including the revelation of leaders who discouraged disclosure. Those cases do not include at least 42 more that have been identified as not having been properly investigated. That is not to mention new Pentagon published statistics showing student-reported assaults at West Point, the Naval Academy and the Air Force Academy.

So after all the accusations and denials, the truth is finally revealed about Bill Cosby’s lifetime of raping young women, who were unfortunate enough to cross his path. The answer as to how he got away with it for so long, lies in his skill of slipping a Methaquolone pill, otherwise known as a Quaalude, into a drink he would give them. It would render them helpless to escape his subsequent sexual assault. Of course, he had also built a persona of America’s Grandpa, that was the ultimate deception.I first heard about quaaludes (‘ludes) in college in the 60’s. Apparently, he did as well! The word was that if you could slip one into a girl’s drink, she would be more compliant than otherwise. The records show that Cosby had multiple prescriptions filled at least throughout the 70’s, then apparently, subsequently found other sources. It became his “MO” and many women his victim. But that game is over now, most likely for the duration of his life! As with most abusers, Cosby felt he had a way to evade the light from shining on what he was up to. He thought he was safe and would never get caught, but If accused, he could claim it was consensual. It is what all abusers think, regardless of the form that abuse takes, and sometimes it can work for a long while. But when the light finally does shine and reveals the truth, the rule is that the longer the perpetrator got away with their nasty deceptions, the deeper the hole they will have dug for themselves. Epstein escaped via suicide. I think they’ll be keeping a close eye on Bill!