Darwen's Shaws Sinks factory supervisor in dock for slapping bum of female trainee during telling off
A factory supervisor who slapped a woman trainee on the bottom at work has been hauled up before a judge in Preston.
Phillip Butterworth admitted a charge of assaulting the female employee he was supposed to be mentoring.
The city’s Crown Court heard the 58-year-old gave the woman a ticking off for a series of faults in her job polishing sink units. But then, as she turned around, he gave her a “hard slap” on the backside before walking away.
The incident was caught on CCTV at the premised of Shaws Sinks in Darwen and shown in court as Butterworth watched from the dock.
Recorder Tania Griffiths KC gave him a 12-month conditional discharge and ordered him to pay his victim £500 compensation for her distress on top of £250 court costs.
She told him: “I am satisfied it was silly and immature and not sexual.”
The court heard the woman had only been working at the company – the world’s oldest manufacturer of Butler and Belfast sinks – for around two months when the assault happened.
Butterworth had been her coach, training her up to do the job of polishing sinks. He was meant to check the quality of her work and on that day he had remonstrated with her after he found a number of faults with the sinks she was working on.
The CCTV showed the pair in conversation at the rear of the factory before Butterworth slapped her and walked off. She worked until the end of her shift before reporting the incident to police.
When interviewed he denied there had been any physical contact whatsoever, but the TV images proved otherwise.
The victim said she was so upset by the slap that it had caused her stress and had affected her relationship with her husband. She left the company a month later.
The prosecution said Butterworth, of Foss Close, Blackburn, had been in a position of responsibility but there had been “no more than minor harm” caused by the assault.
Recorder Griffiths rejected the prosecution’s application for a restraining order saying the incident had been two years ago and there had not been any problem since, especially as the woman no longer worked at the factory. Butterworth was still in his job.
She said it may have happened due to a “work culture” where he felt comfortable having worked for the company for almost 40 years. But the woman had been put in his care for training and it had been a breach of that trust.