Mercadona regarded consuming the croquette as a very serious crime, sufficient in her opinion to justify the employee’s disciplinary dismissal. However, the Supreme Court of Castilla La Mancha understands that the croquette he consumed has no market value.
The Supreme Court of Castilla La Mancha has ordered the dismissal of an employee Mercadona that he consumed a croquette that had not been sold and that would be thrown away, realizing that there was no embezzlement or profit motive.
In a ruling dated October 15, to which Efe had access, the social court rejects the appeal filed by Mercadona against a May 2024 ruling of the Social Court No. 1 of Toledo.
The worker was providing services in a shopping center and on July 8, 2023, when the store was already closed, he took a croquette from the shelf where the croquettes that had not been sold and were to be thrown in the trash were placed and eaten. It .
A colleague reported the facts to the coordinator, to whom the employee confirmed the facts, and a few days later he was fired.
The company considered the consumption of the croquette as very serious mistakesufficient to justify the disciplinary dismissal of the worker, when “he himself, based on the training, orders and instructions given to him, was fully aware of the fact that he was prohibited from consuming the products of the establishment without pay for it first.”
The Supreme Court understands that the employee’s behavior is not punishable because in this case the croquette he consumed has no market value, “not even negligible, since the same one intended for waste could not be sold to the public.”
Regarding the “misappropriation of company products intended for waste or promotion,” the Supreme Court recalled, the agreement refers to products in the plural and not to a single product. Moreover, the Supreme Court of Castilla La Mancha establishes this there was no embezzlement when there was no ‘legitimate possession of the product’.
Therefore, the TSJ of Castile-La Mancha considered the dismissal as inadmissible and thus confirmed the previous ruling of the lower court.
Source: EITB
I’m Wayne Wickman, a professional journalist and author for Today Times Live. My specialty is covering global news and current events, offering readers a unique perspective on the world’s most pressing issues. I’m passionate about storytelling and helping people stay informed on the goings-on of our planet.
