Editing Operator abuse committee

The '''oper abuse team''' investigates possible misuse or abuse of [[network operator]] authority. The lead network administrator appoints a chairperson for the team, who acts as its representative and director and can appoint team members to assist.

==Members==
The following is a list of the current members of the oper abuse team in order of seniority. The chairperson is listed on the top of the list in bold.

* '''[[ClaireBear]]'''
* [[Aristeo]]

==Charter==
The following is the charter issued by the general consortium. This charter outlines the rights and responsibilities of the members of the team, the chairperson of the team, and the team as a whole.

<blockquote style="font-size: 8pt;">
A team dedicated to looking at abuse of IRC operator authority. The team chair is appointed and dismissed by the lead network administrator. The chair of this team may appoint whomever is willing to this team. The chair may order investigations into reported operator power abuse. Once these investigations have been completed, the team votes whether or not the incident should require disciplinary action or if it was not operator abuse or too minor to be concerned with. In this vote majority rules, and the results will usually follow the following scheme, though at the discretion of the chair they may vary. On first offense, warning and censure with a required apology to the user suffice. On the second offense, the team chair will take it up with the admin of the operator in question and ask for a temporary o:line revocation as well as censure. On the third offense there is no option, a two week o:line revocation is mandatory. On the fourth offense it is at the chairs discretion as to what actions should be taken, up to a full o:line revocation. Operators and users should be warned, lying to an abuse team member when being questioned during an investigation is considered perjury, and will result in a 30 day ban or removal of operator privileges. To submit an incident, email {{mail|operabuse@ecnet.org}}
</blockquote>

==Requests==
The oper abuse team will accept requests for investigations from anyone, and the chairperson will decide whether the team has jurisdiction over the case. The chairperson is responsible for ensuring that the oper in question is informed about the case against him and who is accusing him, and that both the oper in question and the complainant are informed of whether the case will be heard.

All team members will hear a case, excluding any recusals or personal leaves. Any team member who feels they have any conflict of interest or personal involvement in the case must recuse themselves from participating in the investigation and final decision. If the chairperson is unable to investigate a case due to a recusal or personal leave, the powers and responsibilities of the chairperson will be transferred to the most senior eligible team as the acting chairperson until the end of the case.

==Investigation==
Participants in a case with the oper abuse team, including third parties, may present their initial statements and their evidence to the chairperson or a delegate chosen by the chairperson through e-mail. This person will forward the information to the other team members as soon as possible. All evidence must be verifiable through redundant logs or trusted sources, and parts of a user's initial statement or items of evidence may be discarded if, in the opinion of the team, it cannot be verified or trusted.

During the course of an investigation, all statements made to the abuse team will be made under penalty of perjury under our network charter. Any users caught lying to an abuse team member under his or her official capacity will be g:lined for a fixed term of 30 days. Before an interview, the abuse team members should inform the user about this penalty and also inform the user that assisting the investigation is completely optional.

The chairperson will give everyone at least one week to present their statements and initial evidence between the opening of the investigation and the deliberations of the team.

==Deliberations==
Once the chairperson determines that the investigation has been completed, she will have discussions with the members of the team to deliberate on what the decision of the team should be. The chairperson or a delegate will help construct a draft decision based on the input of the team. This draft decision should include general and relevant statements on policy, findings specific to the investigations of the case, and binding decrees on what should be done. 

When the final decision is written down in draft form, it will require a simple majority of the participating team to pass. The resulting vote count will be noted along with the final decision. In the event that no draft passes, no decision will be made and no actions will be taken. The chairperson will close the meeting once, in her opinion, the decision has been compiled.

Once the deliberations are over, the chairperson or a delegate will be tasked with informing the operator in question about the decision and ensuring that the decision is enforced.

==See Also==
* [[Oper Guide]] - A guide on how to use network operator permissions appropriately
* [[Rules]] - The acceptable use guide that goes over banable offenses
* [[Policies]] - The bylaws of the network, includes some network operator rules