Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/RHaworth

Case opened on 02:40, 31 December 2019 (UTC)

Case closed on 05:40, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Watchlist all case (and talk) pages: [/index.php?title=&action=watch Front], [/index.php?title=/Evidence&action=watch Ev.], [/index.php?title=/Workshop&action=watch Wshp.], [/index.php?title=/Proposed_decision&action=watch PD.]

Involved parties

 * , filing party

Prior dispute resolution

 * Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive980
 * Administrators' noticeboard/Archive312
 * Bureaucrats' noticeboard/Archive 42
 * Administrators' noticeboard/Archive316

Statement by TonyBallioni
Today, RHaworth unblocked an account that was subject to a CheckUser block without consulting a CheckUser. This is a red line in policy that if done intentionally is worthy of a desysop in itself. While RHaworth has not directly answered the question as to if he knew this is a policy violation, it is my contention that even if he didn't, this is part of a pattern of either recklessness or willful disregard of policy that is unbecoming of an administrator and where the only remedy is a desysop.
 * In this BN thread from September 2019 he intentionally lied to a new user and directed them to bureaucrats despite knowing what suppression was. Evidence that he knew about suppression/the oversight team was discussed on the oversight list at the time, and will be emailed to the Arbitration Committee as evidence. Lying to a new user about suppression to make a point that he doesn't like the lack of audit trail is seriously concerning.
 * Longstanding concerns about his use of speedy deletion. I have privately made jokes that he just opens up CAT:A7 and runs d-batch in twinkle, because the results would be similar. While I'm not sure if it's that brazen in reality, the sheer number of AN threads tells a story (Here and here for recentish examples, but this dates back years, and if a case happens, I'm sure I and others will be able to provide more evidence.)
 * Today he unblocked Velanatti, a CU blocked account. When questioned about it he said that he knew they were the same person, and didn't see the point in consulting with a CU (diff and diff). If an individual thinks they have been unfairly blocked by a CU, that can be reviewed through the normal process of a block appeal to be reviewed by other CUs or to the Arbitration Committee as a whole. Bbb23's block can be reviewed this way, not unilaterally by someone who appears not to care about the rules.

RHaworth's archives are somewhat difficult to search since he uses the old move and replace method, but these are far from the only controversies surrounding his use of the tools, and we now have within a 3 month period two instances of him making serious mistakes involving both suppression and CU. If the committee wants more evidence now before a case is submitted, I can provide it, but I think the evidence above is enough to open a case and allow evidence to be presented so that a desysop can be considered. TonyBallioni (talk) 03:34, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * , there’s a reason I made this public rather than just leaving this at emailing to the list: this is not just about the block/unblock. This is about that as a part of a pattern of behaviour of RHaworth acting far outside the norms of adminship. It is not just the CU unblock. It is the CU unblock, the rudeness to anyone who questions him, the years of questions about his use of speedy deletion, the strong likelihood of lying about not being aware of what suppression is and misdirecting a new user to BN to prove a point when he had previously made the same complaint to the oversight team without having to look anything up or be told where to go. The totality of that is enough for a pattern of behaviour case. I also disagree with Fram on the initial block thing: Bbb23 has already said he would have likely unblocked if done on its own, and made good on that. The issue here is not his conduct, but rather the years of RHaworth behaving in a way below standards of admin conduct (also, if above word limit, extension request. Don’t plan on saying more.) TonyBallioni (talk) 11:32, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by RHaworth

 * Regarding the BN thread from September 2019: the accusation of "intentionally lying" is a total libel. When an humble admin looks at user:SPMCC88, they see, or rather, find that they cannot see any of the deleted edits. Nowhere is there any hint that something called "oversight" has been applied. Sure, I may have been told about oversight before - am I not allowed to forget? So rather, than say to SPMCC88 "sorry I have no idea", I pointed them somewhere else.


 * Regarding the unblocking of User:Velanatti, I did not realise that it is set in stone that check user blocks must be discussed with the blocker. I have apologised to the blocker. The user has been re-blocked and then unblocked by the original blocker. In my view, matter satisfactorily resolved.


 * Please explain why my user talk page archives are more difficult to search than those created by an archive bot. I provide a search box at the top of every page.


 * Please remember to view any specific admin action of mine in the light of the total number of my actions. Surely I am allowed to make a few "mistakes"?

— RHaworth (talk · contribs) 09:28, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

You may be sure that following the battering I have received here, I shall be very mindful of the Oversight and Checkuser areas in future. But regarding Checkuser, please remind me where it is written that when a user has been blocked by an admin following a Checkuser check, that admin must be consulted before another admin undoes the block. — RHaworth (talk · contribs) 10:13, 19 December 2019 (UTC)


 * so what is wrong with my actions in respect of Dan Spilo? I saw a page with not one, but three speedy deletion reasons. I deleted it. Others disagreed. It has been taken to deletion review. I shall accept the deletion review decision. Wikipedia quality control working efficiently in my view. — RHaworth (talk · contribs) 09:28, 19 December 2019 (UTC)


 * I have been pointed to WP:ADMINACCT. It lists six grounds for de-sysopping. I deny having committed any of those offences apart from occasional mild amounts of biting. I can only repeat my claim: I am human: I make mistakes. The proportion of mistakes to total actions is acceptably low. I usually correct my mistakes myself willingly or acquiesce in corrections made by others.


 * I feel somewhat flattered to hear Espresso Addict describe my talk page as "a de facto welcome mat". I will take that remark to heart and recognise my responsibility to be more welcoming.


 * Regarding Barkeep49's review of 17 days: I am conscious that even when I am trying to be kind and helpful, my written messages tend to come out abrasive. I shall try to take more time in composing messages. Certainly I take to heart the need for me to be less bitey. Specifically I will not refuse to reply to messages because they use unlinked wiki jargon (e.g.. a "naked" DRV) or lack wikilinks to the page under discussion. I will try to give a reply even to messages as cryptic as this one.


 * I have now seen where it is written regarding Checkuser blocks. I think the message should be repeated in WP:CHECKUSER. — RHaworth (talk · contribs) 10:13, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Cryptic
Regarding speedy deletions - if arbitrators don't want to have to wade through the ANI archives Tony provided, Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive1021 is both brief and egregious (though to RHaworth's credit, he at least self-reported there). If you want something not just "recentish" but current, Deletion review/Log/2019 December 17. —Cryptic 04:21, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by ConstantPlancks
The use of CheckUser and the bitey, out-of-policy block for "socking" of an editor seeking help by Bbb23 should also be looked at. This whole thing has been a clusterfuck of heavy-handed admins abusing tools to the detriment of the community. See here Administrators' noticeboard ConstantPlancks (talk) 05:06, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

I'll add that the two accounts that were blocked had already said they were the same person. There is no reason or justification to run checkuser after that. It becomes a fishing expedition. It's against policy to fish for other accounts and there is no reason to believe there were other accounts. Confirming that a user was truthful w/ checkuser followed by a checkuser block that only confirmed checkuser was improperly used is an abuse of checkuser that should result in removal of checkuser access. ConstantPlancks (talk) 04:29, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Bbb23
I wanted to elaborate a bit on Tony's comments about my CU block and the unblock request by the user. By the time I logged on to Wikipedia this morning, the unblock request had already been made and RHaworth had already unblocked the user. At that point, I felt that the priority was to notify RHaworth of his breach of CU policy. By the time RHaworth responded (sort of), another administrator had "reinstated" the block. It would have been a bit awkward for me to then consider unblocking the user. However, if I had seen the unblock request in the normal way, I would probably have either unblocked the user myself or at least stated that I had no objection to the user being unblocked. I doubt that in this particular instance, the request would have to have been reviewed by another CU or the Committee. I actually apologized to the user for being "yanked" around (blocked, unblocked, reblocked) and tried to explain briefly what happened. As I'm writing this, I just noticed that the user has made another unblock request post my explanation. I will AGF their explanation and unblock them...and go to bed. I don't think that my unblock in any way mitigates RHaworth's breach of policy and believe the Committee should accept the case.--Bbb23 (talk) 05:21, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * See "Checkusers should clearly mark as a 'checkuser block' any block based on findings that involve checkuser data." (subsection "Reasons and communication")--Bbb23 (talk) 13:22, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * So you're saying that my compliance with policy is wrong? Designating a block as a CU block has more than one purpose, and one of them is to indicate to others that the block was not just behavioral. Non-CUs cannot know for sure whether I ran a check as they cannot look at the logs, so this may be helpful if the blocked user requests an unblock. There are some brightline rules in CU policy, e.g., we can't disclose certain information publicly, but as with everything else at Wikipedia, we also have discretion. There was a discussion about the issue of designating blocks as CU-blocks recently, and it quickly became clear that many of us almost always designate blocks as CU blocks whereas others almost never do. You might have a personal opinion as to which is "right", but I don't see how you can fault a CU who does or one who does not. To do that, in my view you'd have to change the policy itself, and it would be a radical change.--Bbb23 (talk) 14:04, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I understand your point, but I think that you're reading too much into it and, at the same time, that your interpretation is too narrow. I don't think that the one section circumscribes the other. Rather, if anything, it enhances it by first communicating to others that the block was based on a check and second that a consequence of such a block is that it cannot be overturned by a non-CU without the consent of either the blocking CU or another. I do appreciate your willingness to discuss this issue; it's not one that is often fleshed out, but I also think it's peripheral to the thrust of this case request.--Bbb23 (talk) 14:39, 19 December 2019 (UTC)


 * As I believe has already been stated, the "message" is written very clearly at WP:CHECKUSER: "Checkusers can block accounts based on technical (checkuser) evidence. They will make clear in the block log summary that they have blocked as a 'checkuser action'. These blocks must not be reversed by non-checkusers." --Bbb23 (talk) 14:40, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Question to Committee. My question assumes that nothing changes before clerk action and that this case is accepted. Regardless of whether I am formally added as a party, will the scope of the case include my conduct? If this question belongs somewhere else, feel free to dispose of it as you wish, but I would appreciate an answer.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:58, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Fastily
RHaworth performs *a lot* of administrative actions and while there are bound to be mistakes (believe me, I would know), I am troubled by the way he chooses to respond to concerns about his administrative actions. Even a brief look through his talk page history and simple search of AN/ANI archives reveal a plethora of complaints complete with BITEy/acrimonious retorts from RHaworth. Today's incident isn't a one-off occurrence; this has literally been going on for years. I'm also unimpressed with his unusual talk page archiving scheme, which appears to be deliberately messy in order to confuse would-be complainers. I'll note for the record that while I have nothing personally against RHaworth, his behavior reflects poorly on the group of admins who do a lot of the heavy administrative lifting on Wikipedia.

I encourage the committee to accept this case and review RHaworth's behavior as applicable to WP:ADMINCOND. - F ASTILY   05:55, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Berean Hunter
— Berean Hunter   (talk)  06:24, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Regarding the claim that the checkuser tool has been abused, this is not true. After being told that they shouldn't write about themselves, that didn't stop them from making another edit several minutes later and then they pulled the tags off despite the fact that COI is true and the article still had puffery and peacock language. After being told not to create an article in their name, they created a new account with a different name to avoid scrutiny and leave the previous warnings behind for an attempt at article recreation. Creating a new account would only be justified if they forgot the password...any other reason in this case is garbage. Running a check is at the discretion of the checkuser and in this case, the pulling of COI tags, avoiding scrutiny and having the hallmarks of a paid editor means that running a check is well-justified to confirm the socks and has the potential of turning up other UPEs/socks. There has been no abuse of the checkuser tool.

Statement by SmokeyJoe
This is premature. Fram’s WP:AN thread is a good forum, and it has not played out. ArbCom is a forum of last resort.

TonyBallioni and Bbb23 take themselves too seriously, and they take an overly legalistic approach to Wikipedia rules. If that block was a sacred block, it was a bad sacred block. The blocked user’s claim comes down to whether he is to be believed, not privileged private information. The unblock was correct, and Bbb23’s agreement speaks to that. IAR seems to apply.

RHaworth conducts himself too casually. He doesn’t seem to be conversant with the fine details of policy. He is very quick and loose in deleting unimportant pages. The current DRV case is exactly an example, he misused CSD policy, when instead the page should be sent to AfD and SNOW deleted.

If ArbCom needs to do anything, it is to devalue the 2010 ArbCom statement at https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=374236496#Statement_on_checkuser_blocks. While it is broadly correct, in letter and spirit, that is not how Wikipedia is supposed to manage itself, by committing ArbCom statements to stone as Gospel. That statement was not intended for a newcomer who is just first grasping the purpose of an account, having first registered an account matching their first topic. If an administrator believes that a Checkuser block has been made in error, the administrator should first discuss the matter with the Checkuser in question, and if a satisfactory resolution is not reached, should e-mail the committee. As appropriate, the matter will be handled by the Ban Appeals Subcommittee, by the Arbitration Committee as a whole, or by an individual arbitrator designated by the committee. is absurd in the context of this particular example. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:35, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

There has been no abuse or misuse of the checkuser tool. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:40, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Andrew Davidson
The main issue here seems to be the blocking/unblocking. As I understand it, the first block was a bad block. RHaworth's action of unblocking was therefore reasonable and WP:IAR applies. Be that as it may, if the case proceeds, Oshwah should be made a party because their action of repeating the block appears to have been a breach of WP:WHEEL, "Do not repeat a reversed administrative action when you know that another administrator opposes it." Andrew🐉(talk) 10:07, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Fram
The use of CU, while not necessary, was not wrong either (it was obvious and self-admitted already that the two accounts were the same, but one can never know that there were others I suppose). However, when the CU results show that there is nothing beyond the already known, that nothing nefarious or hidden is going on, and that no actual breach of the socking policy has happened, then the fact that the two accounts are from the same person is not a justification for any kind of block, and certainly not a sacrosanct, un-overturnable CU block. There was no reason at all that, if a block was deemed necessary, it couldn't have been a regular block, overturnable by any other admin; and worse, no block was necessary, only a warning and some guidance. WP:AGF and WP:BITE don't magically disappear when you are a checkuser (and neither does WP:ADMINACCT: having the time to rush to berate someone else for overturning your block, but not having the time to explain the block itself, shows a greater for bureaucracy than for getting things right in practice).

The use of speedy tags, deletions, and salting, are also problematic, but can be better dealt with at the AN case. But if the overturning of this CU block is case-worthy, then the actual problematic CU block should be investigated as well and Bbb23 added as a party. (Let me repeat: checkusering the editor was not a problem, but the CU block is an issue.) Fram (talk) 10:24, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Black Kite
I couldn't really care less about the CU unblock, to be honest. The oversight thing is bizarre, but I'm shrugging my shoulders on that one too. What I do find utterly incredible in this whole saga is this tagging of the article as an A7 speedy by RHaworth. Now bear in mind this is an admin who does a shitload of speedy deletions, yet clearly, judging by this example, has no idea what A7 actually means (an article about a real person that does not credibly indicate the importance or significance of the subject). Just look at the article at the time - yes, it's a bit promotional, but there is clear credibility, not to mention some decent sources including a full page interview in The Hindu! Still, we've got the backup that although an admin got the tagging wrong, another admin won't make the same mistake and actually delete it, will they? Oh, right. And the reason I'm prioritising this is because this is what drives new users away. Black Kite (talk) 10:58, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * OK, this is getting silly now. This is what RHaworth has deleted while this has been running (and I haven't looked at everything)
 * 19th December
 * Anyone else think PKH DAS was a G11?
 * Eris Lifesciences wasn't an A7 (might not be completely notable, but it ain't an A7)
 * Ultimate Custom Night - Deleted as a G1?? Let's just go through G1 again - "This applies to pages consisting entirely of incoherent text or gibberish with no meaningful content or history. It does not cover poor writing, partisan screeds, obscene remarks, implausible theories, vandalism or hoaxes, fictional material, coherent non-English material, or poorly translated material. Nor does it apply to user sandboxes or other pages in the user namespace. In short, if it is understandable, G1 does not apply."


 * 20th December
 * Cricingif ain't an A7 (one of the most notable cricketers ever is promoting a cricket app? That's not your run-of-the-mill bit of software made by Kevin in his basement, is it?). It's not a G11 either - purely factual.
 * Sheikh bin Faisal bin Khaled Al Qassimi definitely isn't an A7 (clear claim of importance) or a G11 (there's no promotion at all, it's all facts)
 * Mmm. Apparently this might be a valid G5 deletion, but it wasn't deleted as G5, and it turns out that RH has deleted it A7 twice before as Sheikh Mohammed Bin Faisal Al Qassimi ... when it wasn't an A7 on either occasion.

Statement by Nnadigoodluck
Considering the way things turned out yesterday towards the block, unlock, re-blocked and unblocked again issue, whether this request for an ArbCom case will be accepted or not, concrete efforts should be made to prevent such from repeating itself in the foreseeable future.  NNADI GOOD LUCK  ( Talk &#124; Contribs ) 11:47, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Boing! said Zebedee
I want to echo Black Kite's point, but in a more general way than specifically this incident - and not specific to any admin, but as part of the background to the case request. I used to do a lot of CSD work, but I gave it up largely because of the increasing abuse of the CSD criteria I kept seeing from admins. Editors not understanding the critera and nominating incorrectly is understandable, but I expect admins to be able to recognise that, to decline incorrect nominations, and explain to the nominator. And I expect admins to not make incorrect nominations themselves. But almost every CSD patrol session I did, I'd see admins deleting nominated articles when the nomination was obviously incorrect. Someone above mentioned the similarity with just opeaning a category and running a delete script on it all, and I've seen what looks like that approach many times (but can't remember the guilty parties). A7 was probably the worst, with the deleting admin appearing to treat it as a notability issue and deleting articles which contained very clear claims to importance or significance. G11 was probably the second worst, and is for "pages that are exclusively promotional and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to conform with WP:SOAP". But I frequently saw it abused with no stronger rationale than effectively "I think this is trying to promote something", or based solely on an alleged COI from the article creator - often articles containing not even a hint of promotional writing. If the committee takes this case, I hope you'll consider this a key part of it - and if not, I hope you might at least offer a few words about it and perhaps clarify the obligations of admins working on CSD. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:57, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * I also want to echo a comment made by Kusma, that "Many of these pages should probably be deleted, but not speedily". Many times I've seen pages deleted on the apparent sentiment that they obviously should be deleted even if they don't strictly meet any CSD criteria. In many of these cases I'd probably agree that the pages should be deleted - but the CSD criteria are strict (and as limited and objective as practical) for a reason, they have been decided by community consensus stretching back years, and admins do not have a mandate to exercise their own judgment and delete pages summarily that do not meet the criteria. Sure, it might take more time and effort to go through the PROD and/or AfD processes and it might be seen as a waste of time, but admins do not have the right to shortcut that, and doing so is an abuse of power. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 13:59, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * My comments so far have been general, but after reading Barkeep49's comments I have to offer some thoughts on the case brought against RHaworth. That list of diffs spread over just 17 days is really quite disturbing, and I can't help thinking it might be due to admin burnout. It's summed up by a comment in this diff, "For those of us who work in the deletions area the only emotion is a resigned acceptance that we are going to see the same inappropriate rubbish for ever." I understand the feeling, but that does not excuse treating editors who make mistakes with the disdain I'm seeing in a number of those diffs. The 1,000th person an admin encounters submitting a bad article (or making any common mistake) should be treated with the same civility and assistance as the 1st, and not with condescension that's built up over the intervening 998. I've seen the same descent into dismissive snarkiness from others before, and in at least one case it's resulted in a desysop. I'll also say, judging from those 17 days of diffs, that RHaworth's responses to those who question his decisions also show unacceptable condescension and snark. So, I would now urge the committee to take this case, and examine what I think is an overall unacceptable admin attitude. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:33, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * No, G11 is about content, not intent. The former (promotional content) can be objectively assessed, but the latter (intent) can not. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 23:33, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes, I've seen admins delete incorrectly tagged G11s too, as I explained just above. They're wrong, plain and simple. I really see no possible way to interpret "This applies to pages that are exclusively promotional and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to conform with WP:SOAP" (italics in original) other than as what it actually says. What part of it do you find in any way ambiguous or hard to understand? It's in plain English (some of the plainest we have anywhere in our policies) and plain English needs no community discussion to interpret. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 00:53, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * (PS: Off to bed now, so no further responses tonight - though I can't think of anything more I can say to explain it, so I'm probably done here anyway. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 01:01, 20 December 2019 (UTC))


 * In the light of continuing objections to some of his deletions, I have asked RHaworth to consider temporarily suspending his CSD work. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 16:09, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * And he has agreed. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 10:47, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Mz7
Speaking generally, I think it is an important bright-line rule that administrators should first consult with a checkuser before lifting checkuser blocks, even if a case appears obvious. For various reasons, checkusers don't always state publicly everything that they know about a particular case. For example, there could've been logged out editing involved or perhaps more accounts than there initially appears. There could even be something quirky in that data that makes a user's explanation suspicious or unlikely. Simply put: the checkuser has access to more information than you do, so you should talk to them first.

How the Arbitration Committee responds to an out-of-process modification of a checkuser block is up to the Committee. If it's a one-off, unwitting mistake that is unlikely to happen again, a quick reminder would probably be best. In the past, however, the Committee has used it as part of the rationale to desysop an administrator—see Special:PermanentLink/700515004 for an example from 2016—particularly if the action fits as part of a pattern of suboptimal administrative decisions. Mz7 (talk) 12:31, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Kusma
(edited, some comments of others may refer to earlier versions of this statement) There are several aspects to this case, and the Committee should clarify the scope if a case is accepted. There is the issue of the CU block (which was apparently unnecessary) that RHaworth probably shouldn't have undone (it looked like a block for something not blockworthy at all, so RHaworth should have assumed there is additional private evidence that led to the block, and double check with the blocking CU). But this requires trust in the CUs only making CU blocks when truly necessary, and CUs need to make sure they do not overstep their bounds. From a 2010 ArbCom motion: Checkusers are reminded that because designating a block as a "Checkuser block" means that it cannot be reviewed on-wiki or on unblock-l, this term should only be used when confidential information has been used in the blocking decision. In this case, the accounts were known to be the same person and nobody so far has stated anything about the existence of confidential information related to the block.

Then there is a long history of RHaworth deleting things very quickly, and under an interpretation of CSD that leads to more things being deleted than my own. Many of these pages should probably be deleted, but not speedily, so I have some sympathy with his position, especially as he does respond to reasonable requests. In any case, CSD is not nearly as high-volume as it used to be pre-WP:ACTRIAL, so speedy deletions should be done quite a bit slower. Looking at some examples like the recent Energy institute DRV and, however, raises the suspicion that RHaworth does not check page histories before deletion, which is simply not OK when doing speedies.

Is there something to do here? Sure, several people could improve how they work here, and we should definitely try to err more on the side of not biting. I am not totally convinced that Arbcom has to be involved, but if Arbcom accepts the case, it would be helpful not to just consider RHaworth's speedy deletions and how he can improve his work, but also to clarify (again) how untouchable CU blocks are and how CUs should behave. —Kusma (t·c) 19:33, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Thryduulf
There is enough evidence of community concern with RHaworth in his talk page archives and the threads at ANI that, regardless of the merits or otherwise of today's unblock, I think the committee should open a case to examine his admin actions and determine whether there is or is not grounds for a desysop. Separately, I also think that every time an admin reverses a CU or OS action without either (a) consultation with or (b) express permission from someone with the relevant permission; or reverses a CU/OS action in direct contradiction to the comments received, the Committee should look in to the circumstances and determine if action is required. This need not be a full case in every instance, but the decision to desysop or not desysop must always be actively made. If an admin is unhappy with a CU or OS action taken by an individual functionary they should seek input from other functionaries or the Arbitration Committee. Ultimately the Ombudsman commission is available should the need arise. There is no need for action to be taken by someone not in possession of the full facts.

Finally, if a case is opened the Committee will need to be explicit about its scope in order to be fair to all parties. Thryduulf (talk) 13:01, 19 December 2019 (UTC)


 * I cannot endorse strongly enough what Boing! said Zebedee says above,
 * Pages on the English Wikipedia may only be deleted when there is a consensus to do so. The criteria for speedy deletion is an intentionally narrow list of the only circumstances in which this consensus does not need to be established in advance of deletion. If a page does not meet both the letter and the spirit of at least one criterion then it must not be deleted without going through the relevant XfD or Prod process, regardless of how time wasting that might seem. If there are any pages that someone thinks should be speedily deleteable then the correct process is to nominate them at XfD, so that a documented record of them always being deleted is available to support a proposal for a new or expanded criterion at WT:CSD. Thryduulf (talk) 15:06, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * There have been many community discussions about the CSD criteria over the years. Every single one of them that I am aware of has agreed that the criteria should be interpreted and enforced narrowly, as explicitly noted in various places:
 * At WP:CSD:
 * A Deletion policy:
 * At Guide to deletion
 * At Field guide to proper speedy deletion (only an essay, but it is linked from the CSD page indicating that, at least to a degree, that it reflects community consensus):
 * All together the message is unequivocal. If you interpret the criteria "loosely" then you are acting other than in accordance with the policy and need to stop doing so immediately. Thryduulf (talk) 21:35, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * No, there is no ambiguity - read the criteria: If the page could be edited, without a fundamental rewrite, to be neutral then the criterion does not apply. It doesn't matter if there is a possible COI. It doesn't matter if the intent is to promote. If the content is neutrally written, or could be made neutral without deleting it all and starting again, then G11 does not apply. This is even more so in draft space as that namespace exists for the specific purpose of allowing articles to be created and developed without requiring immediate perfection. If there is any doubt about whether a CSD criteria applies then it does not. Thryduulf (talk) 23:56, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * If admins have been deleting those taggings (and sadly it doesn't surprise me) then both you and they have been getting it wrong. Those pages should be restored (without prejudice to XfD) for being deleted out of process and the admins given a strong reminder that policy requires them to follow the CSD criteria as written. Thryduulf (talk) 10:30, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * At Guide to deletion
 * At Field guide to proper speedy deletion (only an essay, but it is linked from the CSD page indicating that, at least to a degree, that it reflects community consensus):
 * All together the message is unequivocal. If you interpret the criteria "loosely" then you are acting other than in accordance with the policy and need to stop doing so immediately. Thryduulf (talk) 21:35, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * No, there is no ambiguity - read the criteria: If the page could be edited, without a fundamental rewrite, to be neutral then the criterion does not apply. It doesn't matter if there is a possible COI. It doesn't matter if the intent is to promote. If the content is neutrally written, or could be made neutral without deleting it all and starting again, then G11 does not apply. This is even more so in draft space as that namespace exists for the specific purpose of allowing articles to be created and developed without requiring immediate perfection. If there is any doubt about whether a CSD criteria applies then it does not. Thryduulf (talk) 23:56, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * If admins have been deleting those taggings (and sadly it doesn't surprise me) then both you and they have been getting it wrong. Those pages should be restored (without prejudice to XfD) for being deleted out of process and the admins given a strong reminder that policy requires them to follow the CSD criteria as written. Thryduulf (talk) 10:30, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * At Field guide to proper speedy deletion (only an essay, but it is linked from the CSD page indicating that, at least to a degree, that it reflects community consensus):
 * All together the message is unequivocal. If you interpret the criteria "loosely" then you are acting other than in accordance with the policy and need to stop doing so immediately. Thryduulf (talk) 21:35, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * No, there is no ambiguity - read the criteria: If the page could be edited, without a fundamental rewrite, to be neutral then the criterion does not apply. It doesn't matter if there is a possible COI. It doesn't matter if the intent is to promote. If the content is neutrally written, or could be made neutral without deleting it all and starting again, then G11 does not apply. This is even more so in draft space as that namespace exists for the specific purpose of allowing articles to be created and developed without requiring immediate perfection. If there is any doubt about whether a CSD criteria applies then it does not. Thryduulf (talk) 23:56, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * If admins have been deleting those taggings (and sadly it doesn't surprise me) then both you and they have been getting it wrong. Those pages should be restored (without prejudice to XfD) for being deleted out of process and the admins given a strong reminder that policy requires them to follow the CSD criteria as written. Thryduulf (talk) 10:30, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * No, there is no ambiguity - read the criteria: If the page could be edited, without a fundamental rewrite, to be neutral then the criterion does not apply. It doesn't matter if there is a possible COI. It doesn't matter if the intent is to promote. If the content is neutrally written, or could be made neutral without deleting it all and starting again, then G11 does not apply. This is even more so in draft space as that namespace exists for the specific purpose of allowing articles to be created and developed without requiring immediate perfection. If there is any doubt about whether a CSD criteria applies then it does not. Thryduulf (talk) 23:56, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * If admins have been deleting those taggings (and sadly it doesn't surprise me) then both you and they have been getting it wrong. Those pages should be restored (without prejudice to XfD) for being deleted out of process and the admins given a strong reminder that policy requires them to follow the CSD criteria as written. Thryduulf (talk) 10:30, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Deleting something is one of the most harmful things that an admin can do, so all the relevant policies are very clear that nothing may be deleted without consensus to do so. The criteria for speedy deletion (which per above are explicitly narrow and intended to be interpreted narrowly) are the only situations where the community consensus is strong enough that any discussion would always end in consensus to delete for this to be presumed. If there is any doubt or ambiguity in whether a given page meets a speedy deletion criterion it does not and it must not be speedily deleted. If there are any good-faith objections to speedy deleting something then it must be discussed. IAR only allows you to ignore rules when doing so would uncontroversially improve the encyclopaedia. Speedily deleting something that does not meet the letter and spirit of one or more speedy deletion criteria is always controversial so IAR cannot apply. Thryduulf (talk) 12:39, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Re: Bbb23 There seems to be very little overlap between the allegations regarding Bbb23 and the allegations regarding RHaworth so I think it might be better to run them as separate cases. As it is not really relevant to RHaworth's issues who placed the CU block or whether it was good or bad, the case about them would be best focused on his handling of such blocks in general. In contrast whether it was correct or not is key to Bbb23's actions, so those questions would be in scope on that case. (Note that while I'm strongly in favour of a case regarding RHaworth, I don't yet have a firm opinion whether one is warranted for Bbb23). Thryduulf (talk) 13:17, 22 December 2019 (UTC)


 * it depends what the scope of the case is. If it is to examine the actions around the one incident then absolutely everyone's conduct needs to be examined, however if it is to examine RHaworth's admin conduct more generally (which is what almost all the evidence presented here so far is about) then it makes less sense, especially if (as I suggest) there should be a separate case about Bbb23's conduct and/or (as Worm That Turned appears to be suggesting) a separate case about CU Blocks in general. Thryduulf (talk) 13:23, 23 December 2019 (UTC)


 * The speedy deletion criteria list the only cases where administrators can delete pages without explicit consensus (it's not about immediacy, as several criteria require a time delay). The snowball clause is not an exception to this - that is for cases where the consensus (for some action, not necessarily deletion) is so overwhelming that the discussion can be closed early. Whether RHowarth undeletes on request is not really relevant - there would be no need to ask if he didn't delete things out of process. Thryduulf (talk) 21:14, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Nosebagbear
On the RHaworth behaviour side of this, I'm inclined to think that a desysopping is unnecessary, but that a stern "be more careful in the future" isn't enough - we've had multiple ANIs with that as the result. Everyone freely grants he does staggering amounts of work, so naturally more errors will come through. But it's the way concerns and complaints are handled, both on this talk page and in ANI discussions, that I think needs Arb consideration.

As to what intermediate resolution route is most suitable I leave to the Arbs (both current and incoming), but I do think something should be done.

I don't have a particular opinion at this point as to whether it should have been a checkuserblock at all, but if it goes to full case, I do think it should be included in the scope. Nosebagbear (talk) 14:39, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Elahrairah
Basically what Kusma said. I think it's worth bearing in mind that RHaworth's approach is perhaps a product of a time when CSD was higher-volume than it is now and there was less time to consider. Each one of us can always improve at CSD, but I think he does a lot of the "heavy lifting" and some poor calls are the effect of taking on such a high volume of work. As for the other aspects of the case (CU), I think everything has already been said. Admins should probably get a huge neon pop up reminding them about CU blocks at login as it's an easy landmine to step on for admins who take no interest in the area. ElAhrairah inspect damage ⁄berate 17:15, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Vanamonde
I'm glad brought this here, because this has seemed increasingly inevitable to me all year; there's been just too many people asking questions about RHaworth's use of the tools for ARBCOM not to examine their conduct, even if it's just to clear up some of the allegations and allow RHaworth to continue to contribute with less of a cloud hanging over him. I endorse in their entirety the statements by and  above about speedy deletion. Additionally; every time RHaworth's conduct (or that of any other productive admin) is examined, someone makes the "all of us make some mistakes, these are prolific admins so they make more" argument, and I think that argument is seriously misleading here. There's broadly two types of mistakes from admins; bad actions taken because someone missed something (didn't read a sentence carefully, confused two usernames, made a typo during a google search, etc), and bad actions taken because of a genuine misunderstanding or misjudgement of policy. The first kind is common forgetfulness; the second kind needs to be learned from and then not repeated. Prolific admins can be forgiven more mistakes of the first category, but if they are repeatedly displaying serious misunderstandings of policy, especially repeated misunderstandings of the same policy, it's a serious problem. In discussions about RHaworth's deletions, he quite often says "I made a mistake" in reference to egregiously misapplied CSD criteria, is hauled up to AN for the same mistake some months later. I don't know this is an inability or an unwillingness to learn the CSD criteria, but ARBCOM needs to look at it either way. Vanamonde (Talk) 17:49, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Barkeep49
Looking at RHaworth's current talk page there are, in 17 days, the following issues:
 * Speedy deletion review request by an IP and a logged-in editor . The request was confusingly worded which RH stated and sent to DRV . I was pinged as it speedy deleted something I had just draftified after an AfD. It felt like such an obvious mistake I said nothing because I thought RH would just correct without incident. When this was taken to DRV, the editor included the wrong link  which RH passively aggressively corrected . DRV overturned with every participant suggesting it was a bad delete . The G12 is particularly troubling - I would expect any sysop doing copyvio work to suspect, based on the URL alone, that the supposed copyvio was in fact a Wikipedia mirror. When the DRV closed I went back to ask what I could have done to avoid this situation in the future, figuring that RH had considered the edit history (something I think there is evidence to suggest is not the case) before deleting  to which I got a reply from RH  that I misunderstood  but was him taking issue with my word choice
 * Cynicism (fairly earned no doubt) about CSD
 * Dan Spilo (mentioned by Cryptic) defended on the basis of the number of speedy tags placed . Discussion is ongoing current consensus appears to be overturn the deletion
 * Ponni Concessao with separate issues raised by Fram   and Bbb  which elicits an apology from RH
 * A question from an editor is met with a scolding for the use of common wiki abbreviations but no answer to the substance of the question . Only after a follow-up  does the editor get a substantive answer.
 * A request for a restoration of an A7, A Cloud Guru, which contained a credible claim of significance "the largest cloud computing training library in the world". This request was met with a scolding . A different editor then, playfully, questioned the validity of the A7 . RH replied questioning the playfulness aspects rather than the substance
 * A request to restore a G7 . RH's deletion was defended by another sysop . RH answered the question but only with a healthy dose of scorn to the requesting editor
 * A DRV notification for a speedy deletion for A7 of a 13 year-old article whose speedy deletion had already been declined by another sysop

Multiple times in 17 days of talk page discussion, RH was derisive towards experienced editors (though admirably not as BITEY to newer editors even those who are clearly here for Spam or COI) and legitimate concerns over their use of multiple speedy deletion criteria. These are concerns not only about their interpretation of the criteria, but the level of care exerted in performing speedy deletions. Barkeep49 (talk) 18:14, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * RH reversed last A7 saying it was edit conflict Barkeep49 (talk) 19:18, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Pawnkingthree
This case should be accepted to examine longstanding issues with RHaworth's conduct as an admin, including questionable speedy deletions and his cavalier attitude to mistakes (basically, "any admin can just overturn what I do per BRD" ) his condescending and dismissive responses to queries on his talk page, and blatant disregard for policy in overturning a CU block. -- P-K3 (talk) 18:39, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Robert McClenon
This is a case involving administrative conduct. At present, ArbCom and the WMF are the only means by which administrative conduct can be reviewed, because the community has not set up a mechanism for community or other review of administrative conduct. The community has the power to ban an administrator, and has recently used this power in the case of Edgar181 for sockpuppetry, but the community has not set up a mechanism for withdrawing administrative responsibility. Since the community has not provided such a mechanism, complaints about administrators can go either to ArbCom, or to the WMF. Most English Wikipedians agree that the WMF is not likely to improve anything, but can make things worse, so the ArbCom should review administrative conduct if there is a reasonable concern, that is, a concern based on reason rather than on idle suspicion or nonsense. Complaints about administrators mostly fall into two classes, those that have no real value, typically made by combative editors, and those that are serious concerns, made by experienced editors, usually other administrators.

This is a case presented by another administrator. (I mostly agree with User:SmokeyJoe that some administrators take themselves too seriously, and some do not take themselves seriously enough, but that is not critical to whether this case should be heard.) In my opinion, there is enough merit in this case, filed by another administrator, so that ArbCom should review the case. It is not necessary for ArbCom to pre-decide the case. If ArbCom dismisses concerns about administrative conduct that should be heard, the WMF might decide that it needs to review such cases, and that will probably make things worse. ArbCom should accept this case, both because it may have merit, which can be assessed after opening the case, and to minimize meddling by the WMF. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:53, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Praxidicae
I echo Barkeep's concern and hadn't plan to really comment here as I think RHaworth does some of the dirtier jobs on Wikipedia in taking out the trash however their cavalier attitude and lack of accountability concerns me greatly. Since Barkeep also pointed out a more recent interaction I had with them I won't rehash it but I'm very concerned about their lack of understanding actual speedy criteria and response when challenged. Particularly their response here or really, non-response for the DRV for Energy Institute. I understand the possibility that they did not see the speedy being contested but the greater issue here is yet another poor deletion of something that is very unambiguously not an A7 candidate. Praxidicae (talk) 19:14, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * And in my opinion this rather brusque response is unacceptable for an admin and shows a clear lack of understanding of policy. No sources doesn't mean not notable. Praxidicae (talk) 19:23, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by ONUnicorn
As Boing! said Zebedee said above, I have noticed a number of deletions that do not strictly adhere to the speedy deletion criteria. Not all of them were performed by RHaworth, although he does seem to be one of the worst offenders. Boing! said Zebedee says he thinks A7 and G11 are the ones that are most abused, but I would contend it's G4. People tend to ignore the "substantially identical to the deleted version" portion of that criteria. I would urge the committee to take this case to provide guidance to the community and the admin corps regarding how strictly the CSD criteria are to be interpreted. ~  ONUnicorn (Talk&#124;Contribs) problem solving 19:59, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by creffett
Agree in part and disagree in part with 's statement above. I agree that CSD criteria are currently interpreted in a variety of different and not necessarily consistent ways by different admins (and I'll be the first to admit that I subscribe to a "looser" interpretation of G11 and can be a bit trigger-happy with that tag). However, the multiple interpretations of the CSD rules suggests to me that we need to tweak the CSD criteria or the guidelines on applying them. I'm not aware of any significant community discussion about this, and I'd rather see that sort of discussion first before taking the issue to ArbCom. The case should be about RHaworth's recent actions, not about the CSD policy. creffpublic  a creffett franchise (talk to the boss) 20:26, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * , thanks for the very thorough response. I understand what you're saying about narrow interpretation, but at least for G11, I think there's some ambiguity in the interpretation of "promotion." My top two examples of this (both assuming the article is in draftspace) are singers creating a page about themselves because they made a YouTube video or published a song on SoundCloud, and "XYZCorp Marketing" publishing Draft:XYZCorp about a non-notable company. Even if they aren't saying "MC creffalot is an amazing singer, check out his Spotify" or "XYZCorp makes the highest quality Q-42 Widget," I feel that G11 is appropriate because the intent is to increase the visibility of the subject. creffett (talk) 23:28, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * ,, I acknowledge what both of you have said and will take that into account when tagging for G11. The fact remains, however, that I've tagged a fair number of articles that looked like what I described above and they've subsequently been deleted (by several different admins, not just RHaworth). That suggests to me that there's an understanding out there that differs from the official wording. If it is indeed an interpretation issue (rather than intentional disregard of the rules), then it seems more appropriate to start a community discussion instead of taking it to ArbCom. creffett (talk) 00:37, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by arkon
My random 2 cents: When it comes to harm to the Encyclopedia, which of the following is more concerning? A) A completely unnecessary block, somehow wall gardened into not being able to be overturned by even advanced rights holding plebs, or B) Possibly overzealous deletions that can be reversed in a moments notice. Seems like a very easy answer to me. Arkon (talk) 21:06, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by ComplexRational
For starters, I believe the CU block was hasty—one cannot unambiguously assume that the actions of the accounts' operator were in bad faith, so perhaps a discussion first would be better. The rush to a CU block is WP:BITEy, so I feel this should also be given fair weight. Even so, it is clear that such a reversal of a CU block is against policy; two wrongs do not make a right. If the case is expanded to include this background event, I endorse the inclusion of Bbb23 as a party; some users below raise good points, and there have been similar questions about their behavior and adherence to ADMINACCT and BITE (both at ANI and their talk page) that remain unanswered. It would be unfair to scrutinize only one admin's actions given the scope of the case and years of questionable actions leading to it. ComplexRational (talk) 21:09, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

In regards to WP:ADMINACCT, I would indeed expect admins to not engage in BITEy behavior. The issues raised by above are concerning to say the least; I wholly endorse their statement. Similarly, this behavior is also questionable: RHaworth declined one of my CSD taggings through Twinkle's [] function (as suggested by the edit summary). I believe this could have just as easily been accomplished in one edit without a rollback and without treating my edit as vandalism. (Side note: I think the tagging was technically valid, but redirection was a fair outcome that I did not originally consider.) I can't speak for other users, but I can say that I've never had a CSD tagging declined through any undo function—other admins simply went about another course of action—and I imagine a new(er) user could be outright discouraged by this. Given that these are not new concerns, and nothing conclusive has been decided elsewhere, I recommend ArbCom review this case to ensure that WP:ADMINACCT and WP:BITE are being upheld. ComplexRational (talk) 22:56, 19 December 2019 (UTC)

I'm willing to drop this minor incident, but for completeness, also see this talkpage exchange initiated by RHaworth in response to my statement here. ComplexRational (talk) 17:28, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Espresso Addict
As an admin who has worked with A7/G11s, I'd endorse the points made on speedy deletion by Black Kite, Boing! said Zebedee, Thryduulf & Vanamonde. I'm particularly concerned by RHaworth's attitude to his mistakes as being an acceptable price of the volume of work he performs. Since autoconfirmed status has been required for article creation, the flood of A7s has decreased to a trickle and few of those I see require immediate deletion. It is impossible for non-admins to check deletions for appropriateness, and hard even for those able to view redlinks to check the accuracy of a prolific deleter. The complaints raised on RHaworth's talk page and at deletion review probably underestimate the problem, as inexperienced editors often lack the confidence or competence to complain.

I'm also concerned by his habitual brusque interactions with new editors on his talk page. It's been said in my hearing that RHaworth's talk page is the encyclopedia's de facto welcome mat for a lot of good-faith new editors, which puts a burden on him to be actively helpful even to those whose first efforts are subpar. Espresso Addict (talk) 00:39, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Buffs
RHaworth's talk page history is replete with severe WP:BITEy replies. I've attempted to address this with him to no avail. Repeatedly brought up at AN/ANI, his attitude appears to be "I do so much that I can treat noobs any way I want...besides, I'm an admin and I can do what I want". There is no remorse and no indication he sees anything wrong with his actions; his edit history is littered with numerous instances of shortcutting speedy deletions with criteria that do not apply. It's past the point of what's acceptable and I think it's time to (at least) tell him in no uncertain terms: ENOUGH! If ArbCom decides to remove the bit, I support it! Buffs (talk) 05:56, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Add to this discussion: I've brought this up before to see if there is community consensus. It was declined as it was deemed to effectively be a desysop discussion. Fine by me...now we're here instead of discussing whether we should have brought it here...a distinction without a difference that seems inevitable. I would strongly encourage ArbCom to take up this matter as WP:AN and WP:ANI (among many other boards) are not getting the point across to RHaworth: this behavior is NOT acceptable. As long as he remains an admin, this will continue. There is no other board that can handle such a request. Denying it will only embolden more atrocious behavior. Judging from the number of people who are joining in on this case, there is VERY strong interest from the community for ArbCom to make a ruling on the matter. Buffs (talk) 06:19, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Quoting RHaworth: "Please remember to view any specific admin action of mine in the light of the total number of my actions. Surely I am allowed to make a few 'mistakes'?" No! You are NOT permitted to be so brash with noobs and apply speedy deletion criteria just because it's shorter solely because "well, I do a lot". You have repeatedly bitten the noobs, speedily deleted articles that shouldn't have been, and you've refused to slow down, step back, reassess your behavior, change your approach, etc in ANY meaningful way. Enough is enough. ArbCom, PLEASE take this up and set the example that such brash behavior is NOT tolerated. Not taking this case is tantamount to endorsing such behavior. If there is any question why we are losing people from Wikipedia, look no further. It's because of actions like this we aren't getting new blood. Buffs (talk) 06:36, 20 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Too quick to pull the trigger for deletions of Drafts that have potential, given a little time/TLC (D - Deletion(s) of draft(s)/original, A - AFD/DRV resulting in keep).
 * Evan Nagao D A
 * Shefali Rana Dx3 in rapid succession A
 * Securities and Exchange Commission v. Electric Bond and Share company D A


 * Biting the noobs/uncivil remarks/Dismissive remarks to questions
 * Learn to provide a link whenever you talk about a page.
 * Count yourself lucky that I am talking to an IP address who could not provide a link
 * Kindly have the decency to wait until someone who a) has no CoI and b) knows what an article here should look like, thinks your company is notable and writes about it here.
 * I can forgive you forgetting what you had done half an hour earlier...But I cannot forgive your apparent inability to look at your own contributions history.
 * You are hopelessly long-winded...Text emailed. Go to DRV if you are not satisfied
 * When asked why a page was deleted, he responded Please keep your fantasies on your own website
 * Edit summary of responses: nothing really needing any reply


 * Others have noted and tried to talk to RHaworth about his behavior with no apparent effect/dismissive remarks about concerns
 * Johnbod
 * Reaper Eternal
 * Andy Dingley
 * me
 * Dozens of other editors at various WP:AN boards...


 * Previous AN complaints
 * IArchive 1008
 * IArchive 980
 * IArchive 903
 * IArchive 852
 * IArchive 753
 * Archive 312

Given that administrators are expected to respond promptly and civilly to queries about their Wikipedia-related conduct and administrative actions and to justify them when needed and that problems are ongoing for years despite claims of reform, I submit that RHaworth is not fulfilling his duties as an Admin despite requests in the past month alone from multiple people and acknowledgement of such shortcomings in previous WP:AN cases. His good actions do not outweigh the bad. I request community opinion as to whether we should remove the bit from this individual. I recognize that speedy deletion admin work can be stressful (lots of spam to sift through), but if admins aren't going to do it in a kind manner, they will drive off new users and this needs to stop. Failure to take SOME action further demonstrates differing standards of behavior for admins and other users. Buffs (talk) 19:56, 23 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Support review of Bbb23 as well per Lepricavark, et al. Buffs (talk) 18:19, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Galobtter
I think RHaworth may be the most prominent example of "admin who persistently violates policy, but never in a major enough fashion for a case" - as mentioned by many others above, he regularly deletes things without enough attention and without following WP:CSD and WP:BITEs users. I think a case should have been accepted a long time ago, but maybe violating the bright line rule of overturning a checkuser block is enough of a major policy violation for a case? I strongly urge ArbCom to accept this case, as I think ArbCom should be more willing to look into admins who have a pattern of misbehavior where each incident examined by itself does not seem to warrant a case, but when looking into the totality of the situation, it is clear that there are serious issues. I also note that complaints have been raised regarding RHaworth's behaviour for many years, so I doubt the effectiveness of stern warnings etc. Galobtter (pingó mió) 06:33, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by SportingFlyer
I don't have much of an opinion here, just general concern with the Dan Spilo/"some mistakes are acceptable" attitude per the CU error/Barkeep49's diffs/Vanamonde's statement/recent RHaworth CSDs at DRV, but enough of a concern to request ArbCom review this admin's recent behaviour. I also concur with Nosebagbear's assessment about an intermediate or even relatively basic remedy here, and would not mind a decline per WormTT if the decline helps remedy some of the issues. I do think RHaworth a net asset to the project and hope this can be resolved positively. SportingFlyer  T · C  07:58, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by North8000
In the recent WMF dust-up it became clear that we probably don't oversee our admins enough. This is probably because defacto the only place this ever gets done is by arbcom. For editors, arbcom only takes the giant last-resort cases because there are so many other ways to handle editor issues. Until/unless another venue starts actually handling admins, for admins arbcom needs to take more routine cases (not just egregious or pre-proven ones) because defacto there is nowhere else. So you should take this one, and it shouldn't be a giant deal. Most likely it should end up with a warning and direction, which for admins, only arbcom does. Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 14:28, 20 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Deepfriedokra

 * RHaworth has performed more than 100 deletions in the past 24 hours, so probably his error rate is pretty low. ArbCom will need to make note of this.


 * In this thread-- User talk:Deepfriedokra-- RHaworth questions my tagging pages for CSD, rather than "boldly" deleting myself, after I've gone ahead and blocked the creator. (I prefer to measure twice and cut once. If I've made an error, this is an opportunity for it to be caught.) The subtext of the discussion suggests to me that RHaworth is at times overwrought, which causes him to make mistakes and become snappish. I would recommend RHaworth pledge to respond open-mindedly to this thread, agree to do less, and to be less impatient with others. Given the shear (excessive) volume, I see him as a net positive. However, the time is come to address these concerns via ArbCom.--  Deep fried  okra    17:39, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Yes!. Wish I'd said that.--  Deep fried  okra    23:30, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * per  RHaworth does undelete when asked.--  Deep  fried  okra    19:53, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Ivanvector
Administrators should not act, and especially should not undo administrative actions, without being aware of the totality of facts about the action. Checkuser blocks (and oversight and arbcom blocks) are marked as such because administrators without access to the relevant tools cannot know the totality of facts. It stands to common sense that administrators in that situation should consult. It's alarming that any administrator of any tenure would not understand that, let alone one as active and long-tenured as RHaworth. As for the block: it possibly being a bad block does not forgive the breach of policy and lack of consultation. Either "don't undo checkuser blocks at peril of your mop" is a policy or it isn't. The case should be accepted on those grounds alone.

That said, though I find it stunning that RHaworth could have not been aware of this from the start, I'm inclined to take him at his word that he acted with good intent notwithstanding the seriousness of the action, and he now understands the importance of this very simple rule.

As for speedy deletions, it is heavily unfair to lay the the problems with the WP:A7 criterion at RHaworth's feet. The criterion is garbage, and when you have garbage instructions you get garbage operation. Criteria for speedy deletion are supposed to be uncontestable, as in "no user could reasonably disagree that a page meets (or does not meet) the criterion", but with the wishy-washy open-to-interpretation "claim of significance" language these can be reasonably contested every time. That's not RHaworth's fault. I've seen no good evidence that RHaworth is deleting A7-tagged articles indiscriminately, and beyond that it's a matter of RHaworth interpreting the criterion more (or maybe less?) strictly than some other admins, but acting in good faith nonetheless. That's a matter of fixing the policy, which the community can do any time it wants without Arbcom's involvement. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 21:46, 20 December 2019 (UTC)


 * checkuser blocks are not irreversible. They merely require a checkuser's input before reversing. Ivanvector (Talk/Edits) 20:24, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Xaosflux
Hello, this is somewhat out of place as it has little to do with the need to accept or decline this case - however, I suggest while this concern has attention a review of MediaWiki:Unblockiptext may be in order. I think it is a good place to place any "last chance" warnings for administrators that are about to unblock an account. Any editor should feel free to help workshop an update at MediaWiki talk:Unblockiptext and use an edit request when ready. Best regards, — xaosflux  Talk 16:54, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Govindaharihari
Nothing majorly disruptive here or massive out of policy worthy of a dysop. Not worth a full case/christmas case, give a motion offering advice and a warning and move on.Govindaharihari (talk) 18:01, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Lepricavark
If we're going to grant an irreversible (or even nearly irreversible) status to checkuser blocks, we need to be very certain that these blocks are imposed properly. In my experience, Bbb23's CU blocks do not inspire that kind of confidence. To give some background, I request and received a 6-month block from Bishonen. The block was not in any way intended to evade scrutiny for behavioral issues and was purely based on my personal wishes. About a month after receiving the block (which included the revocation of tpa and email), I caved to the urges to resume my Wikignoming work (which was unwise on my part, but I was nevertheless improving the encyclopedia). It was not long before Bbb23 swooped in and indeffed both my newly created account (reasonable) and this one as well (heavy-handed and unreasonable). My indef was only removed after Bishonen commented in opposition to the block. See the related discussion here.

In my opinion, Bbb23's handling of the situation was lacking in both empathy and common sense. There were any number of possible courses of action that would have dealt with the extra account and enabled me to get to back to work (since I was never blocked for being a problematic editor), but instead Bbb23 went for the nuclear option. He did eventually unblock me, but I still resent having been treated as nothing more than a common sockmaster. I also have my doubts about whether Bbb23 even had valid cause to run a CU; even if he did, he was hardly justified in his heavy-handed actions. I was lucky; a few respected editors went to bat for me and helped me get unblocked. Otherwise, I might have remained indeffed after evading a self-respected temporary block. I suspect that there have been other editors who were unfairly blocked by Bbb23, but we don't know about them because they didn't know how to appeal the block (or they were new/inexperienced, so it was easy to shut them up). Let's not act pretend that Bbb23's blocks are infallible. They aren't. Lepricavark (talk) 22:08, 21 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Also, I find this post by Bbb23 to be unnecessarily aggressive. An admin should be able to raise concerns with another admin without immediately playing the 'You might get desysopped' card. If Bbb23 was truly at a loss to understand RHaworth's actions, he might have tried asking questions before issuing ultimatums. Lepricavark (talk) 22:24, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Dave
Generally speaking admins should always consult the CU admin before unblocking a CU account but ofcourse mistakes happen, I also don't really see any issue with his deletions, My only concern is his snappiness with people that's really my only issue..... IMHO a case is not warranted and desysoppings/sanctions aren't needed either. – Davey 2010 Talk 22:33, 21 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Ched
I've thought about this for a while now, and my statement is to question the assessment that makes in his accept post. Correct me if I'm wrong, but it almost seems as though you're not in favor of reviewing WP:CSD or WP:BITE behavior. I'd have to take exception to The community is perfectly capable of addressing issues surrounding CSD tagging and BITE. Therefore, this case should be restricted to investigating and evaluating administrative conduct.

The VERY top of the VERY FIRST section of Arbitration/Policy states: To act as a final binding decision-maker primarily for serious conduct disputes the community has been unable to resolve (there is no unless it's an admin clause)

If other statements by other users above me are to be believed, then this "BITE" issue has been going on for years unchecked. Apparently there have been numerous AN/ANI reports, without resolution. I believe that sums it up quite well: Even a brief look through his talk page history and simple search of AN/ANI archives reveal a plethora of complaints complete with BITEy/acrimonious retorts from RHaworth. Today's incident isn't a one-off occurrence; this has literally been going on for years.

I'm fairly sure that you wouldn't be saying that policy says we'll look at behavior, but if it's an admin, then we'll only look at their behavior with admin. tools, and not other behavior. I would ask you to reconsider the scope aspect of your statement, or perhaps more accurately the wording of it. Thank you. — Ched (talk) 01:01, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Jehochman
I think the behavior of all parties needs to be scrutinized, including Bbb23. It is telling that an administrator felt the need to reverse Bbb23’s block. It is also telling that Bbb23 is using Checkuser status to place irreversible blocks that could instead be managed through ordinary consensus-based admin activity. Bbb23 recently demonstrated to me that they may not have the good sense to serve as a Checkuser. If they are added to the case, I will provide the evidence. Jehochman Talk 03:10, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

I find Lepricavark‘s statemet curiously consistent with my own unpleasant experience of trying to talk with Bbb23. Jehochman Talk 03:13, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

To be clear, there should be a case. Rather than the pattern of past years where ArbCom robotically desysops every party, the goal should be to get the parties to agree to raise their standards. With that agreement any faults can be documented and everyone can go about their business. Jehochman Talk 14:16, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

do you want your actions to be reviewed or would you prefer they not be reviewed? Jehochman Talk 17:44, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by The Blade of the Northern Lights
I tend on the side that RHaworth does a lot of great work, and that people who do a lot will make more mistakes. And I've never understood the lawyering about CSD, the people shrieking and obsessing over every last possible minutia imaginable are rarely the ones I see out there actually, you know, deleting things. Yes, CSD are to be adhered to, but it doesn't override IAR; for some reason this is the only area of Wikipedia where everyone gets their panties in a twist about process over getting the right outcome. Sometimes it really doesn't matter what the right "process" is, and it's not as if any of this is being subjected to damnatio memoriae. As to his communication style, everyone writes a different way; there's certainly nothing blockable, and when new editors make no attempt at all to learn anything about Wikipedia (which isn't really that hard to do) it gets frustrating. The Blade of the Northern Lights ( 話して下さい ) 04:31, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by WBGodric
I echo Jehochman and Leprivacark, in that the behavior of all parties needs to be scrutinized, including Bbb23. He's one of the most unpleasant admins to deal with, having substituted a heavy handed use of CU tools for common sense, since long back. I look forward to provide evidence if the case is broadened to examine BBB23, as well. &#x222F; WBG converse 12:57, 22 December 2019 (UTC)

Comment by Leaky Caldron
Echoing several comments above, I fail to see how you can fairly and impartially consider the Admin. conduct of one of the involved parties and ignore that actions of all of those involved, in particular the CU aspects. Leaky caldron (talk) 09:47, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by RoySmith
There's a few different issues here, but the one which ostensibly got this going is unblocking a CU-block, and that's what I want to address here. The gist is, unblocking a CU block is a desysop-on-sight offense, and a highly experienced admin should know that.

The problem is, there's a ton of rules, and it's unreasonable to expect anybody to know all of them. I work mostly at WP:DRV. It's reasonable to expect I know all about deletion policy. I've also been working a lot in WP:SPI, so it's reasonable to assume I know socking policy. But, there's lots of areas where I don't work, and I'm sure there's all sorts of rules in those areas that I'm not aware of. For all I know, there's a rule that says, ''Saying, "Ni!" to a new user is a desysop-on-sight offence''. How would I know such a rule existed, if I didn't work in shrubbery?

Assume for the moment that I didn't work in SPI, happened to come upon User:AlbanGeller and saw reason to unblock them. I'm a conscientious admin, so I do a little research first. I go to their user page, and find a template telling me that they've been confirmed by a CheckUser as a sock puppet. I don't see anything that says, "and, by-the-way, you can't unblock them". I look in the block log and see. True, if I followed up on that and read Template:Checkuserblock-account, I would discover the restrictions on unblocking, but there's nothing in the log message that's obviously compelling me to go read that page.

For whatever reason, I'm still not sure, so I go to wp:unblocking, where I see a section on "Unacceptable unblocking". I read the bullet points. Wheel warring? Nope. Self-unblock? Nope. Community sanction? Nope. Arbitration enforcement? Nope. At this point, I assume I've done my due diligence. Yes, there is another section titled, "CheckUser blocks" several screens further down, but given that I've just read what looks like an exhaustive list, it never occurs to me to scroll down another couple of screens. So, I click the "unblock" link from the block log page. At that point, I see a few additional warnings, but nothing specific about CU blocks. So I go ahead and perform the unblock, unaware that I've just committed a cardinal sin.

I raised a similar point at another ArbCom case (specifically the last paragraph) a while back. If we're going to have desysop-on-sight rules, they need to be more in your face, to make sure there's no confusion. When you click the unblock button, you should get an explicit warning pointing you to WP:CUBL, and an extra checkbox (or whatever) you have to click to acknowledge that you know you're doing something that puts your mop in immediate danger. Writing another page somewhere is pointless, because there's always more pages to read. Special:Unblock is the common point of every possible unblocking flow (short of some javascript or tool that accesses the API directly) so that's where the warning should be. -- RoySmith (talk) 17:48, 23 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Britishfinance
The specific issues regarding the incident(s) have been well covered by experienced admins above and need no further comment from me. However, as a calibration, I offer the perspective of someone who has been doing a reasonable amount of CSD work. For the last 30 days, I have NPP'ed over 600 articles, and from that have generated almost 60 CSDs (they are all from NPP work), and almost 10 AfDs (also, all from NPP work) – E.g. over 10% of my NPPs ended up at CSD/AfDs; and by comparison, in the last 365 days, over 100,000 articles have been NPP'ed.

RHaworth is one of a small number of admins active at CSD, and who are also very good at handlining the socks/spammers who can make life very difficult for editors working in this area, and some of who are forensically familiar with how to game it/get around CSDs. With two editors doing over 90,000 of the 100,000 NPPs in the last 365 days, the system is one step away from completely breaking down. As discussed here, we are using "shovels and spades" here where we should be using better technology solutions (e.g there is no Cluebot for WP:G4, and I could spend my whole day on G4 CSDs).

I say this not to diminish the incident(s) described above (more experienced than I will opine on this), but to calibrate the implications of a loss of one of the few admins focused on CSDs to the project. Unfortunately, there are many other important processes in Wikipedia were a very "thin wall" of ultra-dedicated admins (the nom of this case is another great example), that stand between the proper functioning of the process, and its collapse. I hope my contribution is of use in this regard, and humbly offer it as such. Britishfinance (talk) 14:37, 24 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Puddleglum2.0
I don't know how much my opinion will be valued here, but I have seen RHaworth around and many of the actions I see them perform have seemed problematic. In this case, I believe that both the CU unblock and the Speedy Deletion matters are problematic, and since the latter issue has been going on for a while now, I believe it is important that the ArbCom accepts this case, reviews the evidence, and takes any necessary actions.

Statement by Crouch, Swale
I don't think CSD is the only case where admins may delete pages immediately, I think it specifies the cases where admins have broad consensus. The CSD even links to the Snowball clause which says "if an article is speedily deleted for the wrong reason (the reason was not within the criteria for speedy deletion), but the article has no chance of surviving the normal deletion process, it would be pointless to resurrect the article and force everyone to go through the motions of deleting it again". I think the point of broad consensus is that undeletion requests of pages that clearly meet the criteria and are unlikely to survive XFD are unlikely to be granted (unless its an old page) while undeletion requests made by another uses are likely to be granted. While I'd expect that if someone deletes a page outside of CSD that they should restore it and follow XFD even if its very likely to be deleted there. Although admins have to adhere to stricter guidelines for such actions than regular actions (due to the fact non-admins can't simply "revert" such actions) that doesn't mean they can't use common senses. And it appears RHaworth does indeed undelete when asked.  Crouch, Swale  ( talk ) 19:33, 26 December 2019 (UTC)
 * well SNOW does make reference to the point of not requesting undeletion for pages deleted outside CSD that would be unlikely to survive XFD. But yes if more than a trivial number of such deletions are questioned that's probably a sign that the admin probably shouldn't be doing do. To do something "out of process" tends to mean doing something against standard (or local) consensus. The deletion policy doesn't appear to specifically prohibit undiscussed deletions outside CSD.  Crouch, Swale  ( talk ) 21:32, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by PonyToast
I do not want to spend too much time reiterating what has already been said by other editors. I am deeply concerned, however, at the number of times this user who is entrusted with special capabilities has "forgotten" or "misunderstood" Wikipedia policies. Making a mistake is one thing; making repeated mistakes is another. Also—for an administrator to not know what Oversight is...that is deeply concerning because Oversight is a major tool in securing personal information to mitigate liability and maintain user privacy. This is important, need-to-know-on-short-notice information. The Pony Toast 🍞 (Talk) 14:17, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Frood
I don't usually comment on this sort of thing, but I'm concerned that somebody who has been an admin for over 14 years doesn't know what oversight is, or that you cannot unblock somebody who is under a checkuser block. These are two things I'd expect every administrator to know. If they don't know these policies, that leaves me wondering what other basic but important policies they don't know. – Frood (talk) 19:59, 27 December 2019 (UTC)

Statement by Tavix
I'm happy to see a case on RHaworth is finally coming to fruition. I put together the case for a case back in May at Deletion review/Log/2019 May 16 but stopped just short of formally filing one. We've been in the same loop over and over again: a complain is lodged, several of his recent mistakes are aired, RHaworth apologies and says he's going to improve, people are satisfied enough by the apology to put down the pitchforks, RHaworth does not improve and another complaint is filed, rinse and repeat. It's gotten exhausting and I hope the matter can finally be put to bed. -- Tavix ( talk ) 05:03, 29 December 2019 (UTC)

Clerk notes

 * This area is used for notes by the clerks (including clerk recusals).


 * A quick reminder to everyone, please respond in your own section to other users and not in their section, per the edit notice at the top of the page. CodeLyoko  talk  18:30, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * This case has been accepted by the committee and will be opened shortly. – bradv  🍁  22:40, 29 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi all, just a quick update the clerks hope to open this up tomorrow. --Cameron11598 (Talk) 00:19, 30 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Hi all, just one more update the case should be opened around 8pm central. We are just waiting for one of our trainee clerks to be able to open the case so we can check off some requirements in their training. --Cameron11598 (Talk) 18:41, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Arbitrators' opinions on hearing this matter (6/0/0)
Vote key: (Accept/decline/recuse)
 * I'd like to hear from RHaworth, but am leaning towards accepting a case. This issue in particular is blown out of proportion, technically it was a CU block, but it was a new editor and fairly clear to everyone what was going on. Yes there could have been more to it, but there wasn't. I'm more concerned about how RHaworth believes he should be interacting with other administrative actions, especially CUOS actions, generally. It may be nothing, and that's why I'd like to hear from him before deciding whether to accept any case. WormTT(talk) 07:25, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * RHaworth, thanks for your comments. I see that you had a discussion in March 2018 on OTRS about oversight and how it appeared for admins, which I believe is why Tony is claiming that you sent the editor to the wrong place intentionally in September 2019. You are a very experienced admin, which does make it quite surprising that you are not aware of our WP:OS policy and norms. Similarly, when something is designated as a checkuserblock, there are certain requirements for admins which are clearly set out on that template. Again, your level of experience does lead to an expectation of knowledge of such areas. Personally, I'd be happy to let this case request sit as a strong warning that similar mistakes in violation of CUOS policy will lead to a full case, and quite possibly a desysop. Would you be willing to pledge to review WP:Oversight and WP:Checkuser and remain mindful of such areas in the future, RHaworth? Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 09:58, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * RHaworth, I've moved your comment back to your own section - per the edit notice on this page, you may only edit in your own section - we do not have threaded discussion on case requests. Bureaucratic, I know, but it's how we keep a bit of order in this stressful environment. As to your question, it's mentioned in checkuserblock, checkuserblock-account (which was in the blocklog), and is all based on this announcement from 2010. You have a number of options regarding checkuser blocks you disagree with, but you should not be simply undoing them. All "Checkuser blocks" should be designated as such in the block log, they are not standard blocks by an admin after a user has been checkusered. <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 10:31, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Final note - The actual policy in question: CheckUser & Blocking policy <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 10:35, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Ok, I appreciate the alternate angle from Fram. Whilst I was tilting towards declining a full case - I do think there is possibly a need to look at whether this should have been a CheckUser block in the first place. I know the committee has made the mistake in the past that they did not look at issues around a case which has lead to larger problems further down the line. I will need to think on this. <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 10:40, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Bbb23, hmmm. I'm not sure about that. I would expect that Checkuser blocks should be used when a block cannot be reviewed without the CheckUser tool. If you can make the same block without the CU data, then I don't believe you should be declaring it a checkuser block with the protections afforded by it. <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 13:50, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Bbb23, I'm not looking to apportion fault on this issue, as I certainly understand your reading of the policy as described. I don't agree that it's the only interpretation of the policy - I'd say both that section and the following section CheckUser explain that checkuser blocks are based on checkuser data (emphasis mine). If the block is not based on checkuser data, it should not be designated a checkuser block. Do you at least see where I'm coming from? <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 14:28, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * , I think you're right that it's peripheral to the case request, and down to an interpretation of policy. I'll raise the issue elsewhere in the near future. <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 14:45, 19 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Accept to look at longstanding issues. I have concerns about CU blocks in general, as discussed, but I accept this case isn't the right place to deal with it <b style="text-shadow:0 -1px #DDD,1px 0 #DDD,0 1px #DDD,-1px 0 #DDD; color:#000;">Worm</b>TT(<b style="color:#060;">talk</b>) 08:59, 23 December 2019 (UTC)
 * First, I don't think the CU block was faulty. Could Bbb23 have marked it as a regular block? Perhaps, and the use of CU blocks is something we should probably address, but that place isn't here. The problem is that it was a CU block and the committee has been very clear about non-CUs reversing CU blocks. For an administrator with the tenure of RHaworth to claim ignorance of this policy is a problem. I have a low bar to accept administrator conduct cases, and this meets it. There are issues with CSD, issues with blocks, issues with Oversight...issues on issues. To examine these issues and whether RHaworth meets ADMINCOND, I accept. Katietalk 14:14, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Accept. Regardless of the context of this particular incident, we have substantial concerns being raised about an administrator's conduct, and as ArbCom is the only venue where that can currently be resolved, we need to have a low threshold for acceptance. I don't think this case should extend to the specifics of the original CU block or other editors involved – just RHaworth's overall admin conduct. –&#8239;Joe (talk) 14:29, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Accept There is enough here to warrant a wider case to examine the various factors at play. The community is perfectly capable of addressing issues surrounding CSD tagging and BITE. Therefore, this case should be restricted to investigating and evaluating administrative conduct. <span style="color:black;text-shadow: 4px 4px 15px white, -4px -4px 15px white">Mkdw  <span style="color: #0B0080;text-shadow: 4px 4px 15px white, -4px -4px 15px white">talk 18:03, 20 December 2019 (UTC)
 * "" I am not sure what that means. ADMINCOND requires all administrators to adhere to behavioural policies which would include BITE. There are other editors and administrators involved in this case request other than RHaworth. The Velanatti/Ponni Concessao dispute has been used as one of the main situations asking to be reviewed. Several editors have been accused of inappropriate CSD tagging and engaging in BITE behaviour. It has not been adequately demonstrated that for those other editors it is an intractable dispute the community has been unable to resolve. Therefore, I (and several others) are stating that ArbCom should solely examine the conduct of the administrators involved per ADMINCOND. The community can handle the other situations and non-admin editors. <span style="color:black;text-shadow: 4px 4px 15px white, -4px -4px 15px white">Mkdw  <span style="color: #0B0080;text-shadow: 4px 4px 15px white, -4px -4px 15px white">talk 02:47, 22 December 2019 (UTC)


 * Accept to review the concerns about admin conduct. GorillaWarfare (talk) 03:27, 23 December 2019 (UTC)
 * Accept. AGK  &#9632;  21:11, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

Temporary injunction (none)
=Final decision=

Administrator conduct
1) Administrators are trusted members of the community, who are expected to follow Wikipedia policies and are held to a high standard of conduct. They are expected to perform administrative tasks to the best of their abilities. Occasional mistakes are entirely compatible with this; administrators are not expected to be perfect. However, repeated or egregiously poor judgment may result in the removal of administrator status.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Leading by example
2) Administrators are expected to lead by example and to behave in a respectful, civil manner in their interactions with others. While such an ideal applies to interactions with all editors, it is particularly relevant to interactions with newer and inexperienced users, as in those cases administrators provide a public face to both the broader administrative corps and to Wikipedia as a whole.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Administrator accountability
3) Administrators are expected to objectively consider criticism and questions relating to their decisions including those raised by anonymous editors. For an administrator to not promptly and appropriately deal with concerns, without good cause, may constitute misconduct.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Deletion and speedy deletion
4) Administrators have the ability to delete articles and other Wikipedia pages from general view, and to undelete pages that were previously deleted. These powers are exercised in accordance with established policies and guidelines, and community consensus.

Under certain limited conditions, a page may be deleted by an administrator without waiting for any discussion. These limited conditions are explained in depth at Criteria for speedy deletion. Administrators should take care not to speedy delete pages except in the most obvious cases.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Checkuser blocks
5) The Checkuser tool allows its users to determine from Wikipedia's servers the IP addresses used by a Wikipedia user account, as well as other technical data stored by the server about a user account or IP address. Access to this tool is restricted to members of the <tt>checkuser</tt> group. It is sometimes necessary to block editors based on evidence obtained using the Checkuser tool. Such a block should be designated by the blocking checkuser as a "checkuser block." Blocks not based on checkuser evidence are not to be labeled as checkuser blocks, even if the blocking administrator is a checkuser. Accordingly, administrators who do not have access to checkuser data must not reverse blocks labelled as checkuser blocks without having first consulted the checkuser team or the Arbitration Committee.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Oversight / suppression
6) Oversight, also known as suppression, provides a means to delete particularly sensitive revisions such that even ordinary administrators cannot see them. The ability to suppress, unsuppress, and view suppressed revisions is restricted to members of the <tt>oversight</tt> user group. From time to time, it is necessary to block editors who have posted suppressible information. These blocks are labeled as "oversight blocks" and administrators who are neither oversighters nor arbitrators must not reverse them without having first consulted the Oversighter team or the Arbitration Committee.

Material that has been suppressed is always considered private or sensitive and referencing it on wiki should be avoided. Queries about the action should be raised by email to a member of the Oversight team, or to the Arbitration Committee, and certainly not at high profile noticeboards.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Treatment of new editors
7) Please do not bite the newcomers, an important guideline, reminds us that "Wikipedia articles are improved through the hard work of both regular editors and newcomers. Remember: all of us were new editors at Wikipedia once.... New members are prospective contributors and are therefore Wikipedia's most valuable resource. We must treat newcomers with kindness and patience—nothing scares potentially valuable contributors away faster than hostility. It is very unlikely for a newcomer to be completely familiar with Wikipedia's markup language and its myriad of policies, guidelines, and community standards when they start editing...".
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

RHaworth
1) has been a Wikipedia editor since the beginning of 2005, becoming an administrator that same year, and has performed over 500,000 deletions. (ADMINSTATS)
 * ''Passed 13 to 0 with 1 abstention at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

RHaworth and deletion
2) RHaworth has regularly performed deletions that do not comply with the deletion policy, specifically the criteria for speedy deletion. The vast majority of the examples raised are not merely "bending" of rules, but at their core, fundamentally at odds with established and prescribed deletion practice. Numerous breaches were cited for CSD A7 and G11; however, there were also individual examples of deletions that were raised about other criteria (G1, G4 , G5 , G10 , G13 , A3  A10 and R3 ), and about summary deletions that neither cited nor implied any criteria for speedy deletion  (Vanamonde93, Black Kite, Thryduulf, SoWhy, Cryptic, Barkeep49 evidence)
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

RHaworth interactions with users
3) RHaworth's interactions, particularly with anonymous or new(er) users challenging his deletions, have frequently been dismissive and brusque (e.g. ) (Vanamonde93, Buffs, Ritchie333, Pawnkingthree, Thryduulf evidence). These interactions have fallen short of community expectations for the treatment of new editors, as well as the expectations for administrator conduct.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

RHaworth, checkuser blocks, and oversight actions
4) There have been incidents involving RHaworth and functionary-level actions. On 6 September 2019, RHaworth incorrectly advised a new user to consult bureaucrats regarding a suppression. A thread on the bureaucrats' noticeboard  was started by the user in question, who was properly advised that bureaucrats are not involved with suppression. On 18 December 2019, RHaworth reversed a checkuser block  without having consulted the blocking checkuser, the checkuser team, or the Arbitration Committee. His responses to criticism of the unblock  showed a lack of understanding of the problem. This unblock led directly to the filing of this arbitration request. While the concerns relating to RHaworth's actions and conduct related to functionary-level actions are valid, there is no evidence of a long-term pattern of such behaviour.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Previous attempts at resolution
5) There have multiple recent reports at AN(I) regarding RHaworth's deletions and treatment of other editors (MSGJ, Vanamonde93 evidence). While RHaworth has been responsive to these various threads, as well as to this arbitration case (RHaworth evidence ), the previous attempts to resolve the various issues have not yielded meaningful changes.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Remedies
Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

RHaworth desysopped
1) For his failure to meet the standards expected of an administrator, including repeated misuse of the deletion tool, RHaworth's administrative user rights are removed. RHaworth may regain administrative user rights at any time via a successful request for adminship.
 * ''Passed 10 to 2 with 1 abstention at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

General reminder
4) Administrators are reminded that checkuser and oversight blocks must not be reversed or modified without prior consultation with the checkuser or oversighter who placed the block, the respective functionary team, or the Arbitration Committee.
 * Passed 14 to 0 at 05:36, 1 February 2020 (UTC)

Enforcement

 * Comments: