BROTHERHOOD OF RAILWAY AND STEAMSHIP CLERKS, FREIGHT HANDLERS, EXPRESS AND STATION EMPLOYES
STATEMENT OF CLAIM: Claim of the System Committee of the Brotherhood (GL-5617) that:
OPINION OF BOARD: Claimant, a Yard Clerk, was dismissed from Carrier's service, after a hearing had been held in the matter, for taking fertilizer that belonged to a corporation located on Carrier's track at Fort Worth, Texas.
The hearing appears to have been free of material prejudicial defect and while it would have been preferable for Carrier to have sequestered the witnesses, no reversible error was committed by its failure to do so. We do not agree with Petitioner that the notice of hearing was defective; it clearly put Claimant on notice of the specific nature of the charges leveled against him and the time and place in question.
Based on an examination of all the evidence, we are satisfied that Claimant's identity has been properly established by the witnesses. Carrier's findings are amply supported by testimony of a truck driver and one of Claimant's fellow Yard Clerks. Their testimony is particularly damaging to Claimant's case and there is no showing that they were motivated by malice or any other improper consideration. While estimates varied as to the amount of fertilizer Claimant had taken, it, in any event, according to the Yard Clerk's and truck driver's testimony, exceeded the number of bags accounted for by the receipt Claimant produced.
Under the circumstances of this case we will not disturb Carrier's findings, supported as they are by substantial credible, though controverted, evi-