WARNING: This story contains content of a sexual nature
Instead of accepting rejection after a female colleague refused to go on a date with him, Gareth Lunar repeatedly harassed her, even asking her multiple times in one day to touch his penis.
“C’mon, just come to bed with me, just one time,” the woman recalls him saying to her after he’d followed her into the medication room at the hospital where they both worked as nurses.
“I told him ‘What the f*** are you saying Gareth’, in English. I then repeated it… to make sure he understood what I said. He did not respond, but just smiled at me.”
It was just one incident in a series of inappropriate behaviours towards the woman, whom Lunar was attracted to despite the feeling not being reciprocated.
Today, the Health Practitioners Disciplinary Tribunal opted to fine him $8000 and censure him for the behaviour. Lunar already lost his job at the unnamed hospital following an internal investigation into the incidents.
According to the particulars outlined in the tribunal’s ruling from a hearing held earlier this year it began in 2018 when Lunar asked his colleague out on a date for her birthday.
She declined but he was persistent and later in the shift followed her to the car where he allegedly said ”Just one date, it’s not going to hurt you”.
Then, while rostered onto another shift with her, Lunar asked to see her browsing history on her phone and suggested that she might be using to watch pornography on it.
“Gareth, I don’t watch porn because I am a decent woman,” she replied.
At this point, Lunar is alleged to have smiled and asked the woman what she did when she had sexual needs.
On another shift Lunar made lewd gestures at the women multiple times including jerking his hand near his crotch and miming masturbation. Another time he suggested she sit on his lap and then while standing behind her he suggested she bend over to be in the “perfect position”.
Lunar then asked the woman to masturbate him at least three times during the remainder of the shift. At one point he was saying to her, “come on, just one” with a hand masturbation gesture near his chest.
The shift culminated with Lunar following the woman into the medication room where he attempted to pressure the woman into coming to bed with him. Lunar denies pushing his body against the woman, despite her claiming that he did.
The tribunal found Lunar guilty of malpractice across some 10 incidents of sexual harassment towards his colleague and said his conduct was a serious departure from acceptable standards.
“These behaviours included: a number of leering or staring behaviours, insults or taunts of a sexual nature, unwanted invitations to go out on dates, requests for sexual favours or pressures to have sex, intrusive questions about a person’s private life, implications of sexually explicit pictures and gestures, and sexually suggestive comments or jokes,” their ruling noted.
“Reasonably minded members of the public would view this conduct as inappropriate and unprofessional. The nature and extent of the sexual harassment by Mr Lunar towards his colleague is such that his behaviour falls well short of conduct expected of a registered nurse.”
Lunar’s current employer, where he’s worked for the last three years, said that he had no issues with inappropriately engaging with staff in his current role. He accepts that his behaviour in pursuing his former colleague was misguided and inappropriate.
Jeremy Wilkinson is an Open Justice reporter based in Manawatū covering courts and justice issues with an interest in tribunals. He has been a journalist for nearly a decade and has worked for NZME since 2022.
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