Chapter 11: The Company

Thursday morning, the president and owner of Coulton Industries arrived at his office to a hoard of serious-looking individuals. Beth hated this portion of the process. She loved her job and liked Mr. Coulton, but there was no choice.

Bob Coulton looked like a confused and defeated man as the team joined him in the main conference room. Tom Willis led the discussion.

“Mr. Coulton, I wish I could tell you today was a good day for your company. Unfortunately, that would be a lie. Your sales manager, Mr. Baird, was arrested last night and is facing multiple counts of rape among other serious charges. We exercised a search warrant on his house last night, and we are in the process or enforcing a similar warrant here, in your offices this morning. Before you arrived at the office, detectives seized the computers associated with Don Baird and his team. Remote salespeople across the country who reported to Don were having their computers seized at the same time by their local cooperating law enforcement agencies. A team of computer specialists descended on your Information Technology department to scan all shared folders in the mainframe and network. It will take two days, essentially shutting down the business for the remainder of the week. Do you have any questions at this point?”

“I can’t believe this nightmare. Other than Beth and Sonia, who are all these other people?”

“Let’s start with who you know. Beth is the woman alleged to have been attacked by Mr. Baird. Her husband, Nate, is sitting to her right. To her left is their lawyer, Mr. Gaines. Sonia Parson from HR is here to respond to allegations of gross negligence on the part of your company in regards to protecting employees from a known predator and enforcing the company morals policy. The others are law enforcement officers and representatives from the D.A.’s office to answer your questions and advise you of the process. Right now, Mr. Gaines, his clients, and Mrs. Parson will be staying to meet with you while the rest of us conduct interviews with a number of employees. Your building is currently on lockdown until those interviews are complete. Do you understand or have any questions?”

“No, sir. Oh, my God.”

I looked at Beth who seemed concerned for Mr. Coulton. Tom and the team left, and Mr. Gaines took over the discussion.

“Mr. Coulton, I regret what we are compelled to do about this, but there are a number of people whose lives have been greatly impacted by the actions of Mr. Baird, and the horrendous and unprofessional actions of your human resources department. Mrs. Freed wanted you to have a chance to know what’s coming. She loves her work here and does respect you, but this process will most likely compromise her ability to function in your company. If you’re not already aware, Mrs. Freed was raped by Mr. Baird on two different occasions at two different trade shows in the past two weeks. One occasion was aided by a date-rape drug, and the other was by force.”