By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

A TOUR boat operator’s first mate has lost his $14,750 wrongful dismissal claim after he was accused of “successfully sabotaging” his employer’s business by derailing its bid to obtain foreign investment.

Ingrid Cooper-Brooks, the Industrial Tribunal’s vice-president, in an October 10, 2025, verdict rejected Mikel Wright’s action against Shore Thing Escapes after finding the company had “reasonable grounds” to believe he had breached its “trust and confidence” by “scuttling” its bid to obtain fresh capital investment to finance expansion from a US couple.

She found that Mr Wright’s leaking of the negotiations between his principals, the Newbolds, and an Arkansas-based couple, Mr and Mrs Kimball, to another investor in Shore Thing Escapes, Katie Moran, was “if not intended to damage, at the very least was likely to damage the [company’s] commercial interests and relationships”.

The dispute between Mr Wright and Shore Thing Escapes erupted when he was terminated on August 11, 2023, after being employed with the tour boat operator for just over four years. First hired on July 18, 2019, and paid at a rate of $175 per tour, he was responsible for assisting the captain;, ensuring passenger and crew safety; responding to emergencies; and the embarkation and exit of persons from the vessel.

After receiving an August 8, 2023, letter summoning him to a meeting “to discuss various complaints and concerns regarding his conduct”, Mr Wright’s employment was terminated three days’ later with Shore Thing Escapes citing “cyber bullying, dishonesty, gross insubordination, lack of professionalism and breach of confidentiality” as the grounds for doing so.

Aggrieved at his employer’s decision, Mr Wright initiated a trade dispute with the Department of Labour that could not be resolved and was ultimately referred to the Industrial Tribunal. He argued that his dismissal was wrongful on several grounds, including that he had not been told of “the specific act of gross misconduct” he had committed.

He also alleged that Shore Thing Escapes had failed to properly investigate the claims against him, as required by the Employment Act, and challenged the company’s ability to have formed an “honest and reasonable belief” that he was guilty of the alleged conduct.

The tour boat operator, though, asserted that it had sufficient justification to have come to such a conclusion and that Mr Wright was “clearly in fundamental breach of his employment contract”. Shore Thing Escapes, in the August 11, 2023, termination letter issued to Mr Wright, asserted that “taking company information that could potentially sabotage the growth of our organisation” had left it “with no other recourse”.

It added that it confronted its now-former first mate with the allegations against him during an August 9, 2023, meeting during which Mr Wright was given an opportunity to respond. He “denied all allegations and refused to acknowledge that his actions and attitude were adversely affecting the company, its stakeholders and the work environment”.

Mr Wright, though, countered that he was never accused of violating any item in Shore Thing Escapes’ code of conduct, and argued that his termination was retaliation for refusing to accept a promotion to the post of training and development officer that was offered to him just ten days’ earlier on August 1, 2023. He asserted that he rejected the offer because it expanded his responsibilities with no accompanying increase in salaries.

Describing himself as a “model employee”, who had “received every available company award”, Mr Wright branded the allegations against him as “trumped up”. However, Georgette Newbold, Shore Thing Escapes’ office manager, alleged that he had begun to “exhibit behavioral issues” and the company had “lodged several complaints regarding his unprofessional conduct” but had been unable to correct these.

And Toriano Newbold, the company’s boat captain, asserted that Mr Wright “works well with guests but doesn’t work well with staff; when corrected, he would withdraw”. This, he alleged, resulted in problems in co-ordinating crew members to fulfill their responsibilities, but the Industrial Tribunal ruled that Shore Thing Escapes had failed to prove its claim of “gross negligence” against Mr Wright.

Ms Cooper-Brooks then rejected the cyber bullying claim, noting that the What’s App message cited by Shore Thing Escapes as “calculated to cause mischief” among its employees - and designed to “create tension and mistrust” - did not name anyone. There was no evidence that any member of staff or others were being bullied online, and the “gross insubordination” claim was also dismissed by the Industrial Tribunal.

As for the “dishonesty” allegation, the Industrial Tribunal said this originated from a series of Instagram messages that Mr Wright sent to Katie Moran, who was described as “an occasional visitor to The Bahamas who sometimes tours” with Shore Thing Escapes, but was later named as an investor in the business during the trial.

Mr Wright alleged that the company had fired his child’s mother because she was pregnant, and claimed it “chooses which laws to follow” and gave the woman involved “an ‘illegal’ ultimatum to take a pay cut or payout”. The company took exception to the implication that it had “engaged in criminality” over that employee’s termination, asserting that the messages were defamatory.

“Upon discovering these messages, the respondent [Shore Thing Escapes] submitted that it became clear that the applicant [Mr Wright] bore a deep grudge and strong ill-will toward the respondent because of the termination of the former employee, to whom he referred as the mother of his child,” Ms Cooper-Brooks wrote. 

Mr Wright, though, while admitting to exchanging the messages with Mrs Moran argued that they were private and thus “inconsequential”. And the Industrial Tribunal, while finding that the messages “amounted to serious and potentially damaging accusation” about the company’s integrity and willingness to obey the law, ruled they did not amount to dishonesty. However, it reached a different conclusion about the leaking of commercial negotiations.

Shore Thing Escapes agreed this was “perhaps the most serious allegation” against its former first mate. Mrs Newbold alleged he was “privy to the respondent’s plan to seek potential future investments in the company from foreign investors in Arkansas for expansion.

“She elaborated that, after the mother of the applicant’s child was dismissed on July 31, 2023, the applicant attempted to sabotage their business and personal relationship with the Morans by revealing to them their intention to approach the Arkansas investors,” Ms Cooper-Brooks wrote.

“Mrs Newbold expressed the belief that this was a deliberate and malicious attempt by the applicant, as they had not shared this information with the Morans, and it had been given to the applicant in confidence. 

The message sent by the applicant to Mrs Moran read: ‘Katie, sorry this turned out this way but heard we going to meet the new investors in Arkansas in September. Hopefully they be more hands on so that things like this don’t get so far’.

“Mrs Newbold asserted that the applicant intended to breach their confidence, which motivated his message to Mrs Moran who, upon receiving the message, forwarded it to her… During the meeting on August 9, 2023, when asked why he informed Mrs Moran about their plan to meet with the Arkansas investors, the applicant replied: ‘Well, we’ll let the chips fall where they may’, and was neither apologetic nor repentant.”

Mrs Newbold also alleged that Mr Wright “successfully sabotaged” their negotiations by contacting Mr and Mrs Kimbell directly. “She noted that following this contact, the Kimbells expressed that they were no longer interested in investing in the respondent’s business,” the Industrial Tribunal wrote.

“She alleged that this occurred as a result of the applicant’s disparaging remarks about the company during his conversation with the Kimbells. She noted that this issue was also put to the applicant during the mentioned meeting, and while he did not deny contacting the Kimbells, he showed no remorse for his actions….

“The respondent argued that it would be difficult to imagine a greater betrayal of an employer than deliberately attempting to injure his employer by sabotaging a business and personal relationship with a third party, referring to the Morans. It was further argued that the applicant succeeded in scuttling negotiations between his employer and potential investors, referring to the Kimbells.”

Finding that Shore Thing Escapes had conducted the necessary investigation, and had accumulated sufficient evidence, Ms Cooper-Brooks ruled it was entitled to treat Mr Wright’s conduct in releasing “sensitive business information” to third parties as “repudiatory”, and “in breach of the trust and confidence” stemming from his employment contract. She thus dismissed his wrongful dismissal claim.