Scandal at Metro-North
Photo: Andrés Correa Guatarasma / Courtesy
A Metro-North employee resigned last month after the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) caught him having sex with a woman at a New York train station while paying overtime. according to a new report.
Investigators at the MTA’s Inspector General (OIG) office, Carolyn Pokorny, saw how the unidentified train driver – a 25-year veteran of the company – took an unauthorized woman to the Croton station grounds. Harmon. (Hudson) three times last spring, according to the report.
OIG employees arrived on May 16 observed the man and woman “kissing and having intimate contact” in a railroad depot “Behind the open door” of her car, according to the document.
The intimacy in the train station, just 10 to 15 feet from the tracks labeled “clearly” “No access except authorized vehicles”, occurred in the middle of the man’s overtime shift and lasted 77 minutes according to GPS data released by MTA teams.
Thirteen days later, investigators from Pokorny’s office noted that the man was taking the woman to the same Metro-North facility to “A long lunch”, according to the report.
Investigators caught the train driver taking longer than permitted lunch breaks on MTA grounds on five other occasions, including a meeting with the same woman that lasted more than three hours.
After several irregularities, he was charged with disciplinary charges in December and resigned. after a disciplinary hearing on Jan. 20, he reported New York Post.
“Metro-North has zero tolerance for the theft of time or the appropriation of funds for personal use,” said MTA spokesperson Aaron Donovan. “This employee was suspended unpaid and then fired, and we are exploring ways to improve accountability.”
The OIG has been launched a fierce pursuit against overtime crooks, amid the long shortage exacerbated by the traffic decline during the pandemic.
In December, five (former) employees of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) were charged federal fraud after having accrued “overtime overtime” that collectively exceeds $ 1 million dollarsalthough they didn’t work.