Farting in the workplace or in the general direction is not a form of bullying, court says

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An Australian appeals court on Friday ruled that repeated flatulence targeted at another individual wasn’t a form of bullying or assault.

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The ruling by the Victoria state Court of Appeal came after David Hingst, a 56-year-old engineer, brought a case against his former supervisor for constantly farting toward him, demanding $1.3 million in damages from his former employer in Melbourne, Construction Engineering.

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The court upheld an earlier ruling stating that even if Hingst’s allegations were found to be truthful, breaking wind doesn’t constitute bullying.

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But Hingst remains defiant and says he will take his case to the country’s High Court, Australia's final court of appeal. The court’s judges wrote in their ruling that Hingst argued that “flatulence constituted assaults” and “alleged that Mr. Short would regularly break wind on him or at him, Mr. Short thinking this to be funny.”

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The man testified in court claiming that the bullying forced him to move out of a communal office space to avoid supervisor Greg Short's flatulence.

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Yet Short would still enter Hingst’s small, windowless office a few times a day just to break wind, he said. This led him to spray Short with deodorant and call him “Mr. Stinky.”

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“He would fart behind me and walk away. He would do this five or six times a day,” Hingst said outside court.

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But flatulence isn’t the only form of bullying alleged by Hingst, adding that Short was also abusive over the phone, used profane language and taunted him.

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