PARTIES TO DISPUTE:

STATEMENT OF CLAIM:
"1. Carrier violated the agreement when, without just cause, it suspended from service Mr. C. E. Shelley, Clerk at Chattanooga, Tennessee ninety (90) days - February 3 through May 3, 1982.







OPINION OF BOARD: In this case, Claimant was working as Chief Train Clerk
 on November 14, 1981. Trainmaster/Agent C. C. Bryant was in the Yard Office to check on clerks calling records, having previously received complaints about Company personnel not being able to contact Chief Train Clerk Shelley on the telephone as the telephone was always busy. Shelley was on the telephone when Bryant was in the office, and Bryant asked Shelley to whom he was talking. Claimant answered by asking Bryant why he wanted to know? Bryant posed the question again, and Claimant's reply was the same. Bryant asked the Claimant if he was refusing to answer the question, and the Claimant answered that he was not refusing, but declining.

 Bryant left and went to his office, where he met with Assistant Superintendent Martin. Claimant came to that office and knocked. Bryant opened the door and Claimant demanded to know what Bryant was telling Martin.
                    Docket Number MS-25646


This type of behavior continued, with the Claimant making demands as to whom Bryant was talking with when a phone call for Bryant interrupted their discussion, and what he was saying.

 Bryant was Claimant's immediate supervisor. The telephone belonged to the Carrier. Claimant was using it during working hours. Bryant made a reasonable request for information, and Claimant refused to answer that request, albeit couching that refusal as "declining." Claimant's continued behavior, including going to his supervisor's office and making demands on the supervisor can only be seen as clearly insubordinate.

 The Claimant asserts that he was not afforded due process in the hearing which was held, alluding to its very length as proof of that. In reviewing the transcript, the Board finds no proof of a lack of duty process. To the contrary, it appears to have been conducted in a proper manner, and much of its length seems due to the long responses given by Claimant.

 As to the appropriateness of the discipline assessed, it is always difficult to ponder the forces present in insubordination. Clearly, if Claimant had stopped while his Supervisor was in the Yard Office and simply answered the question, the discipline would have been excessive. But Claimant did not stop. Claimant persisted in his insubordination, escalated the matter and, by his behavior, justified the discipline imposed.

 FINDINGS: The Third Division of the Adjustment Board, after giving the parties
 to this dispute due notice of hearing thereon, and upon the whole
 record and all the evidence, finds and holds:

 That the Carrier and the Employes involved in this dispute are respectively Carrier and Employes within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act, as approved June 21, 1934;

 That this Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute involved herein; and

        That the Agreement was not violated.


                          AWARD


        Claim denied.


                            NATIONAL RAILROAD ADJUSTMENT BOARD

                            By Order of Third Division


Attest:
        Nancy J. r - Executive Secretary


Dated at Chicago, Illinois, this 30th day of January 1986.