A school's board of governors yesterday escaped being held in contempt of court after withdrawing a letter of termination to a fired manager.

A Supreme Court injunction granted earlier this month prevented CedarBridge Academy from firing any of its five managers. Information Technology (IT) manager Bussie Ible was sacked hours later.

Contempt proceedings began on May 3, with lawyer Venous Memari arguing the board instructed the termination knowing of the court order.

Mr. Ible had refused to sign a contract saying he could be fired at any time.

During yesterday's Supreme Court hearing, Puisne Judge Ian Kawaley made no order on the issue of contempt because the letter was withdrawn and issued costs for Mr. Ible.

Board chairman George Scott earlier told the court he received the order via e-mail from principal Kalmar Richards hours before Mr. Ible was fired. The court order was sent as an attachment to the e-mail.

Ms Memari said: "You make a decision to fire Mr. Ible, then you get an e-mail from Kalmar Richards saying they can't fire members of staff. You read the e-mail didn't you?"

Mr. Scott said yes.

She continued: "And yet you say you didn't know what it was."

Mr. Scott said he didn't have the contents in his hand.

But Ms Memari continued to quiz him.

"You saw that Mr. Ible was one of the plaintiffs and it didn't occur to you because it involves Mr. Ible let me open [the attachment] and see what it says? I put it to you that your story defies logic.

"I put it to you that by the time Mr. Ible received that letter, you know there was an injunction."

Mr. Scott denied he knew about the order.

Stuart Crockwell, the school's chief operations officer, told the court he was given the termination letter at 4 p.m. on May 3 but Mr. Ible had called in sick that day.

He said he received a phone call that evening from Bermuda Public Service Union's (BPSU) general secretary Ed Ball Jr. asking if Mr. Ible had been sacked.

Mr. Crockwell said he told Mr. Ball the manager had not been fired.

He was fired minutes later and Mr. Crockwell said he signed the termination letter in front of Mr. Ible.

The COO said he had "no knowledge" of the injunction.

When Mr. Ball gave evidence, CedarBridge's lawyer Michael Smith questioned why in his first affidavit, he didn't mention the phone conversation with Mr. Crockwell.

"You made a mistake as to what you and Mr. Crockwell said. He didn't say anything about an injunction and you didn't ask him," Mr. Smith said.

Mr. Ball denied the allegation.

Mr. Smith continued: "When you sat here on May 4, you noticed the hole in my friend's case. You noticed that there was a problem. You noticed that there's no way that Mr. Crockwell could have been guilty of contempt [because] he didn't know about the injunction."

Mr. Ball said no.

Speaking after the evidence, Mr. Kawaley said: "It's simply surprising that a court order is served on a Monday afternoon and it was circulated to the chairman of the board and a meeting takes place and it's described what is in the papers in the e-mail and a dismissal decision was still made because no one bothered to look at the order.

"No one knows why. It isn't as if to say the order was left with the receptionist and it didn't come to the attention of anyone in authority at all."

Both lawyers later put in applications regarding the injunction that was put in place on May 3.

Mr. Smith argued it should be lifted and said: "The board can't fulfill their function if they can't fire and hire. I am saying the injunction needs to be lifted so this school can be run properly."

Ms Memari responded: "We say that it really wasn't unreasonable for these plaintiffs to not sign these contracts. If the injunctions are lifted and they are let go by the employer, then the damages that will be available to them is simply not sufficient."

Mr. Kawaley reserved judgement on the application until a later date but amended the injunction to say no one can be fired without cause.

He suggested Mr. Ible stay away from the school because "tensions" might arise.