More recently, in BER Case 09-6, two professional engineers with similar backgrounds and expertise in electrical engineering were assigned to the same project
In deciding that it was not ethical for Engineer A to make minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without conferring and gaining the approval of Engineer B
NSPE Board of Ethical Review in analogical reasoning about the present case
Cited as precedent establishing that it is unethical for one engineer to make changes to design documents prepared and sealed by another engineer without conferring and gaining that engineer's approval, even under time pressure and even when technically competent to do so
In BER Case 86-2, the Chief Engineer within a large engineering firm affixed his seal to some of the plans prepared by licensed engineers working under his general direction
The Board concluded that it was unethical for the Chief Engineer to seal plans that have not been prepared by him, or that he had not checked and reviewed in detail
Cited as precedent establishing that it is unethical for an engineer to seal plans that have not been prepared by him or that he had not checked and reviewed in detail, grounding the principle of responsible charge and the integrity of the sealing process
BER Case Precedent on Engineer Report Alteration by Non-Engineer Supervisor
NSPE Board of Ethical Review Cases on Unauthorized Alteration of Engineering Reports
Supervisor B takes the reports and thereafter sends them to the client, the property insurance company
There is no supplemental technical or other information to indicate any basis for the apparent alteration of Engineer A's report
Ethical analysis of Engineer A's obligations following discovery of report alteration
Provides analogical reasoning patterns for the ethical obligations of engineers when non-engineer supervisors alter or attempt to alter sealed engineering reports, and for the remedial steps engineers must take upon discovering such alterations.
CausalLink_Prepare and Document Findings
CausalLink_Require Immediate Report Corre
CausalLink_Seek Understanding of Alterati
Chief Engineer BER 86-2 Responsible Charge Detailed Review Obligation Violation
The Chief Engineer within a large engineering firm affixed his seal to plans prepared by licensed engineers and non-licensed graduate engineers working under his general direction, finding it impossible to give detailed review due to the size of the organization and number of projects. The Board concluded this was unethical.
Chief Engineer (BER Case 86-2, Large Engineering Firm)
Responsible Charge Detailed Review Before Sealing Obligation
The Chief Engineer was obligated to refrain from sealing plans prepared by licensed and non-licensed engineers working under his general direction unless he had personally prepared those plans or had checked and reviewed them in detail, and was not permitted to rely on general supervisory involvement and confidence in subordinates as a substitute for detailed review.
The Board concluded that it was unethical for the Chief Engineer to seal plans that have not been prepared by him, or that he had not checked and reviewed in detail.
At the time of affixing professional seal to plans prepared by subordinates
Because of the size of the organization and the large number of projects being designed at any one time, the Chief Engineer found it impossible to give a detailed review of the designs.
The Chief Engineer believed he is ethically and legally correct in not doing so because of his confidence in the ability of those he has hired and who are working under his general direction and supervision.
Chief Engineer BER 86-2 Responsible Charge Review Deficiency
Responsible Charge Detailed Review Before Sealing Capability
The Chief Engineer lacked or failed to exercise the capability to conduct detailed review of plans before sealing, relying instead on general direction and confidence in subordinates — a practice the Board found unethical.
BER Case 86-2: Chief Engineer within a large engineering firm affixed seal to plans prepared by licensed and non-licensed engineers under general direction without detailed review
Sealing plans prepared by licensed and non-licensed engineers without detailed review, justified by organizational size and volume of projects
{'license': 'Professional Engineer', 'position': 'Chief Engineer of large engineering firm', 'supervision_style': 'General direction and supervision without detailed review'}
Affixed seal to plans prepared by licensed and non-licensed engineers under general direction without detailed review, found unethical by the NSPE Board of Ethical Review.
{'type': 'supervisor', 'target': 'Licensed Engineers Under General Direction'}
{'type': 'supervisor', 'target': 'Non-Licensed Graduate Engineers'}
the Chief Engineer found it impossible to give a detailed review of the designs
Chief Engineer Insufficient Responsible Charge — BER Case 86-2
Ongoing during the Chief Engineer's tenure of sealing plans prepared by licensed and non-licensed engineers under general supervision
The Chief Engineer found it impossible to give a detailed review of the designs
Chief Engineer's practice of sealing plans without detailed review due to organizational scale
Board determination that the practice was unethical (resolved as a matter of ethical analysis)
By general direction and supervision, the Chief Engineer meant that he was involved in helping to establish the concept, the design requirements, and review elements of the design or verifying the project status as the design process progresses
Organizational growth making detailed review of all designs impossible for the Chief Engineer
Client Report Suppression Prohibition Analogously Invoked Against XYZ Engineering
Engineer A's original hurricane damage assessment findings
XYZ Engineering's alteration and transmission of Engineer A's sealed reports — substituting commercially motivated conclusions for Engineer A's technical findings — is analogous to report suppression: the firm effectively suppressed Engineer A's genuine professional findings by replacing them with findings that served the insurance company's claim-denial interests, without any factual or technical basis
While the reports were transmitted rather than suppressed in the literal sense, the alteration of findings without technical basis achieves the same effect as suppression — Engineer A's genuine professional conclusions were effectively eliminated from the record and replaced with commercially motivated determinations
Supervisor B Report-Altering Non-Engineer Supervisor
Supervisor B takes the reports and thereafter sends them to the client, the property insurance company.
The prohibition on suppressing professional findings extends to their alteration without technical basis; the client's authority to direct the scope of an engineering engagement does not extend to directing the falsification of engineering findings
Finding no factual or technical basis for the requested change, Engineer A refuses to make the changes.
There is no supplemental technical or other information to indicate any basis for the apparent alteration of Engineer A's report.
Engineer A has an obligation to seek an understanding of his company’s actions and, if there is an effort to misrepresent the conclusion contained in Engineer A’s report, to seek an immediate correction by contacting appropriate authorities, including the state engineering licensure board and other enforcement officials as appropriate.
Beyond the Board's finding that Engineer A must seek understanding and correction, the timing of Engineer A's obligation to act is not discretionary. Engineer A's professional duties were triggered at three distinct and sequential points, each carrying independent ethical weight: first, upon Supervisor B's initial request to alter the reports, Engineer A correctly refused — satisfying his immediate duty of non-subordination. Second, upon learning (or having reasonable grounds to suspect) that the reports were submitted to the insurance company without his authorization, Engineer A was obligated to immediately investigate and notify relevant authorities — not to wait passively. Third, when property owners confirmed the falsification through denied claims, Engineer A's obligation to act had already been overdue. Delay between the second and third trigger points — even if Engineer A lacked certainty — itself constitutes an ethical shortcoming, because the NSPE Code's public welfare paramount principle does not permit an engineer to await confirmation of harm before acting to prevent it. The Board's conclusion implicitly assumes Engineer A acted promptly upon learning of the alteration, but the facts suggest a gap during which identifiable third parties suffered concrete financial harm that earlier action might have mitigated.
The Board's conclusion focuses on Engineer A's obligation to contact the licensing board and enforcement authorities, but does not address whether Engineer A bears a direct and independent obligation to notify the residential property owners whose claims were denied. Because those property owners are identifiable, named individuals suffering ongoing and concrete financial harm — harm directly traceable to reports bearing Engineer A's seal — they constitute a class of third parties whose protection falls squarely within the public welfare paramount canon. Engineer A's obligation to avoid conduct that deceives the public, combined with his stamped document accountability, creates an affirmative duty to inform those owners that the reports submitted in his name do not reflect his actual findings. Notification to the licensing board and enforcement authorities, while necessary, is not sufficient to discharge this duty, because regulatory proceedings may take months or years while property owners remain without recourse. Direct notification to the property owners — advising them that the reports were altered without Engineer A's knowledge or consent and do not represent his professional conclusions — is both ethically required and practically necessary to enable those owners to challenge the insurance denials through legal or regulatory channels. Failure to provide such direct notification would leave Engineer A complicit, through inaction, in the ongoing financial harm caused by the falsified reports bearing his seal.
The Board's conclusion that Engineer A must seek correction and contact appropriate authorities implicitly requires Engineer A to disassociate from XYZ Engineering, but the Board does not articulate the tension between disassociation and the continued access to firm records that effective correction may require. Engineer A faces a structural dilemma: fulfilling his corrective obligations — including investigating the precise nature and scope of alterations, identifying which reports were changed, and providing accurate information to authorities — may require access to XYZ Engineering's internal files, communications, and submitted documents. Immediate resignation, while ethically compelled by the non-association obligation, could sever Engineer A's practical ability to gather the evidence necessary to support a complete and accurate report to the licensing board. The resolution of this tension is that Engineer A's disassociation obligation does not require instantaneous severance before corrective steps are taken, but it does require that disassociation occur without undue delay and that Engineer A not allow continued employment to become a mechanism for suppressing or delaying his reporting obligations. Engineer A should document all known alterations, preserve copies of his original sealed reports, and initiate contact with the licensing board and enforcement authorities before or concurrent with his resignation — not as a condition of it. Continued employment at XYZ Engineering beyond the minimum time necessary to preserve evidence and initiate reporting would itself constitute an ethical violation under the non-association with fraudulent enterprise obligation.
The Board's conclusion does not explicitly address the question of whether Supervisor B's unilateral alteration of Engineer A's signed and sealed reports constitutes the unlawful practice of engineering — a determination with significant implications for Engineer A's independent reporting obligations. Supervisor B, as a non-engineer principal, lacks the licensure required to make technical engineering judgments about the causation of structural damage. By altering Engineer A's sealed reports to change the engineering conclusion from hurricane-related damage to pre-existing structural conditions, Supervisor B exercised a technical engineering judgment that only a licensed professional engineer is authorized to make. This conduct falls squarely within the definition of unlicensed engineering practice under most state licensure statutes. Engineer A's obligation under the NSPE Code not to aid or abet the unlawful practice of engineering, combined with his obligation to report known violations to appropriate authorities, creates a non-delegable duty to report Supervisor B's conduct to the state engineering licensure board — independent of any internal firm resolution, independent of whether XYZ Engineering takes corrective action, and independent of whether the insurance company reverses its claim denials. This reporting obligation is not satisfied by Engineer A's initial refusal to make the alterations himself; refusal prevents Engineer A's own participation in unlicensed practice but does not discharge the separate obligation to report Supervisor B's completed act of unlicensed practice to the licensing board.
A nuance the Board did not address is the question of Engineer A's residual professional liability for the harm caused by the altered reports, even though he neither made the alterations nor consented to them. Under the stamped document ongoing professional accountability principle, Engineer A's seal on the reports creates a continuing professional responsibility for their integrity that is not extinguished by the covert nature of Supervisor B's alterations. While Engineer A cannot be held ethically culpable for alterations made without his knowledge, his accountability for the documents bearing his seal means that the professional and potentially legal consequences of those alterations attach to his license until and unless he takes affirmative steps to publicly disavow the altered versions and establish the record of his original findings. This accountability asymmetry — where Engineer A bears responsibility for documents he did not alter — is precisely why the corrective and reporting obligations identified by the Board are non-optional: they are the mechanism by which Engineer A can discharge the ongoing accountability that his seal creates. An engineer who seals a document and then takes no corrective action upon discovering that document has been falsified in his name has, through inaction, effectively ratified the falsification for purposes of professional accountability, even if he initially refused to make the changes himself.
In response to Q101, Engineer A's professional obligations were triggered in stages, and delay at each stage compounds the ethical violation. The first obligation arose when Supervisor B initially requested alterations: Engineer A was obligated not merely to refuse but to document that refusal and place XYZ Engineering on formal notice that the reports could not be altered without a technical basis. The second, more urgent obligation arose when Engineer A learned — through the property owners' contact — that the reports had been submitted in altered form bearing his seal. At that point, continued inaction constituted an independent ethical violation distinct from the original refusal. The NSPE Code's requirement to hold paramount the safety, health, and welfare of the public (Canon I.1) and to notify appropriate authorities when engineering judgment is overruled in ways that endanger property (II.1.a) do not permit passive waiting. Delay between discovering the alteration and reporting it to the licensing board and enforcement authorities is itself an ethical failure, because each additional day the falsified reports remain operative causes ongoing, concrete financial harm to identifiable property owners. The ethical clock does not reset to zero upon refusal; it begins running again — more urgently — upon discovery of the covert alteration.
In response to Q102, Engineer A bears significant professional liability exposure — though not criminal culpability for the alteration itself — for the harm suffered by the residential property owners. Because the falsified reports bear his seal, they carry his professional authority in the eyes of the insurance company, the property owners, and any reviewing authority. The seal is not merely a formality; it is a legal and professional representation that the document reflects the engineer's findings and judgment. When Engineer A discovered that altered reports bearing his seal had been submitted and were causing claim denials, his failure to immediately act to correct the record transformed his passive non-involvement into a form of constructive endorsement. Under the Stamped Document Ongoing Professional Accountability principle, Engineer A retains responsibility for the integrity of sealed documents even after they leave his hands. This does not mean he is liable for Supervisor B's criminal conduct, but it does mean that his professional license is implicated by the continued circulation of falsified documents bearing his seal, and that affected property owners have a legitimate basis to assert that Engineer A's professional authority was misused to their detriment. The longer Engineer A delays corrective action, the more his inaction resembles acquiescence.
In response to Q103, Engineer A bears an obligation to directly notify the residential property owners whose claims were denied based on the falsified reports, and this obligation is not satisfied by notifying only the licensing board and enforcement authorities. The property owners are identifiable, have already suffered concrete financial harm, and contacted Engineer A directly — meaning Engineer A has both the knowledge and the means to reach them. The Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection principle, combined with the general duty to hold paramount the public welfare (Canon I.1) and to avoid conduct that deceives the public (III.3), supports direct notification. Routing all corrective action exclusively through regulatory channels — which may take months or years to resolve — while property owners remain unaware that the reports bearing Engineer A's seal were falsified would allow ongoing financial harm to persist unnecessarily. Engineer A should inform the property owners that the reports as submitted do not reflect his findings, that he did not authorize the alterations, and that he is taking corrective action. This notification does not require disclosure of confidential client engagement details beyond what is necessary to correct the falsification; the duty to prevent ongoing harm to identifiable third parties overrides any residual confidentiality interest the insurance company might assert in the fraudulently altered documents.
In response to Q104, XYZ Engineering's conduct — directing a non-engineer principal to alter sealed engineering reports for the financial benefit of an insurance company client — constitutes precisely the kind of fraudulent enterprise from which Engineer A is obligated to disassociate under NSPE Code provision II.1.d, which prohibits engineers from associating in business ventures with persons or firms engaged in fraudulent or dishonest enterprise. The disassociation obligation is not merely aspirational; it is a binding constraint. However, disassociation alone is insufficient and must be sequenced carefully. Before or alongside departure, Engineer A must: (1) document and preserve all evidence of the original reports and the alterations; (2) formally notify XYZ Engineering in writing that the altered reports must be corrected or withdrawn; (3) report Supervisor B's unlicensed practice and the firm's fraudulent conduct to the state engineering licensure board; (4) notify appropriate enforcement authorities; and (5) directly inform the affected property owners. Departing without taking these steps would constitute abandonment of ongoing corrective obligations. The Professional Association Disengagement Obligation does not extinguish Engineer A's accountability for sealed documents that remain in circulation; it runs concurrently with, not as a substitute for, his reporting and correction duties.
In response to Q201, the apparent tension between the Stamped Document Ongoing Professional Accountability principle and the Non-Subordination of Sealed Document Authority principle is real but resolvable. Engineer A can be simultaneously accountable for the integrity of his sealed documents and absolved of moral responsibility for the specific act of alteration — but only if he takes active corrective steps upon discovering the alteration. The accountability principle does not mean Engineer A is guilty of falsification; it means he is responsible for ensuring that documents bearing his seal accurately represent his professional judgment, and that when they do not, he acts to correct the record. The non-subordination principle establishes that Supervisor B had no authority to alter the reports — but that principle, standing alone, does not discharge Engineer A's ongoing accountability. The two principles operate in sequence: non-subordination defines the wrongdoer (Supervisor B), while ongoing accountability defines Engineer A's corrective duty. Engineer A cannot invoke non-subordination as a complete shield while remaining passive in the face of ongoing harm caused by falsified documents bearing his seal.
In response to Q202, the conflict between Engineer A's Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Status and the Client Report Suppression Prohibition is resolved by recognizing that the insurance company's status as client does not insulate it from Engineer A's reporting obligations when that client is the direct beneficiary of fraud. The forensic expert non-advocate principle requires Engineer A to remain objective and free from client influence — a principle he honored by refusing Supervisor B's alteration request. However, when the client's interests are served by falsified reports, Engineer A's duty to the public and to the integrity of his sealed documents supersedes any residual duty of loyalty to the client engagement. The client relationship does not create a confidentiality privilege that shields fraud. Engineer A's obligation to report the falsification to the licensing board and enforcement authorities — and to notify the property owners — is not a breach of client duty; it is the fulfillment of the higher professional duty that the forensic expert role itself demands. The insurance company forfeited any claim to Engineer A's professional loyalty the moment it accepted and acted upon reports it knew or should have known were altered.
In response to Q203, the tension between the Professional Association Disengagement Obligation and the Professional Accountability principle requiring continued engagement to investigate and correct the falsification is genuine but manageable through careful sequencing. Engineer A cannot use disengagement as a reason to abandon corrective duties, nor can he use the need to fulfill corrective duties as a reason to indefinitely delay disengagement from a fraudulent enterprise. The resolution is that Engineer A must pursue corrective actions — preserving evidence, notifying the licensing board, contacting enforcement authorities, and informing property owners — before or simultaneously with his departure from XYZ Engineering, not after. Access to firm records needed for correction should be secured before departure; if XYZ Engineering denies that access, that denial itself becomes part of the misconduct to be reported to authorities. Disengagement does not require Engineer A to sever all contact with the matter; it requires him to sever his employment relationship with a fraudulent enterprise while continuing to fulfill his independent professional obligations as the engineer of record on the affected sealed documents.
In response to Q204, the conflict between the Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection principle and any residual client confidentiality obligation is resolved decisively in favor of third-party protection. Client confidentiality in professional engineering engagements does not extend to shielding fraud or protecting the financial interests of a client who has benefited from falsified reports. The NSPE Code's prohibition on conduct that deceives the public (III.3) and the paramount duty to public welfare (I.1) establish that when confidentiality and public protection conflict, public protection prevails. Engineer A's disclosure to property owners that the reports bearing his seal do not reflect his actual findings — and that he did not authorize the alterations — does not require him to reveal proprietary business information or legitimately confidential client data. It requires only that he correct a false professional representation made in his name. The insurance company's engagement details are not the subject of the disclosure; the falsification of Engineer A's professional findings is. No legitimate interpretation of professional confidentiality obligates an engineer to remain silent while identifiable third parties suffer ongoing financial harm from fraudulent use of his sealed documents.
In response to Q301, from a deontological perspective, Engineer A's categorical duty to protect the integrity of his signed and sealed reports was not fulfilled by refusal alone. Kantian deontology requires that the duty be performed completely — not merely that the agent avoid being the direct cause of the wrong. The categorical imperative, applied here, would require Engineer A to act in a way that could be universalized: if all engineers whose sealed reports were covertly falsified simply refused the initial request and then remained passive, the entire system of professional sealing as a guarantee of engineering integrity would collapse. The duty therefore extends unconditionally to active correction and reporting once alteration is discovered. Employment consequences, personal discomfort, or the inconvenience of confronting a fraudulent employer do not constitute morally sufficient reasons to abandon the duty under a deontological framework. The duty to report (II.1.f), to avoid aiding unlicensed practice (II.1.e), and to hold paramount public welfare (I.1) are deontological in character — they do not yield to consequentialist calculations about personal cost.
In response to Q302, from a consequentialist perspective, the aggregate harm to residential property owners whose hurricane damage claims were wrongly denied — loss of insurance compensation for structural damage, potential displacement, financial distress, and the cost of litigation to reverse the denials — vastly outweighs any benefit accruing to XYZ Engineering from retaining the insurance company as a client or to the insurance company from avoiding covered payouts. A rigorous consequentialist calculus would also account for systemic harms: erosion of public trust in engineering assessments, degradation of the professional sealing system as a reliable indicator of engineering judgment, and the chilling effect on other engineers who might fear similar employer retaliation. These systemic harms multiply the direct harm to individual property owners. The consequentialist conclusion is therefore that Engineer A is obligated to pursue every available corrective channel — licensing board notification, enforcement authority contact, direct property owner notification, and disengagement from XYZ Engineering — because the aggregate benefit of those actions (reversing wrongful denials, deterring future fraud, preserving professional integrity) substantially exceeds the personal costs to Engineer A of taking them.
In response to Q303, from a virtue ethics perspective, Engineer A demonstrated the professional virtues of courage and integrity in refusing Supervisor B's initial alteration request — a morally praiseworthy act that required resisting direct employer pressure. However, virtue ethics evaluates character holistically and over time, not merely at a single moment of decision. A person of genuine professional integrity does not simply refuse wrongdoing and then withdraw; they pursue the correction of harm that flows from wrongdoing they have discovered. If Engineer A, upon learning from the property owners that falsified reports bearing his seal had caused their claims to be denied, failed to take active corrective steps — notifying the licensing board, contacting enforcement authorities, informing the property owners, and disengaging from XYZ Engineering — that failure would represent a collapse of the very virtues he initially displayed. Virtue ethics would characterize such a failure not as a momentary lapse but as a revelation that the initial refusal, while correct, was not grounded in a fully developed professional character. The virtuous engineer does not merely avoid being the instrument of fraud; he actively works to undo the fraud's effects when he has the knowledge and capacity to do so.
In response to Q304, from a deontological perspective, Supervisor B's unilateral alteration of Engineer A's signed and sealed reports constitutes the unlawful practice of engineering — specifically, the exercise of engineering judgment over sealed technical documents by a person who is not a licensed professional engineer. This is not a borderline case: altering the technical conclusions of a sealed engineering report is an act of engineering, and performing it without a license violates state engineering licensure laws in virtually every jurisdiction. Engineer A's obligation to report this unlicensed practice to the state licensing board under NSPE Code provision II.1.e (prohibiting aiding or abetting unlawful practice) and II.1.f (requiring reporting of known violations) is non-negotiable and independent of any internal firm resolution. The deontological character of this duty is underscored by the fact that it does not yield to consequentialist considerations such as the possibility that internal resolution might be faster or less disruptive. The duty to report unlicensed practice exists to protect the public and the integrity of the licensure system — purposes that are not served by private resolution between Engineer A and XYZ Engineering.
In response to Q401, had Engineer A immediately notified the residential property owners and the state engineering licensure board upon discovering the alteration — rather than waiting passively until property owners contacted him — it is highly probable that at least some of the insurance claim denials could have been reversed before causing lasting financial harm. The insurance company's denial decisions were based on the falsified reports; a prompt, formal notification from Engineer A that the reports bearing his seal did not reflect his findings and had been altered without his authorization would have provided the property owners with the professional documentation needed to challenge the denials. Early notification to the licensing board would also have created an official record of the falsification, lending institutional weight to any challenge. The counterfactual underscores that Engineer A's obligation to act was not merely prospective — to prevent future harm — but also retrospective: to mitigate ongoing harm already in motion. This reinforces the conclusion that delay in acting after discovering the alteration is itself an ethical violation with measurable real-world consequences.
In response to Q402, internal escalation by Engineer A to XYZ Engineering's senior leadership or legal counsel — before Supervisor B submitted the falsified reports — represented the most efficient and least disruptive corrective pathway available at that stage, and its omission is a significant gap in Engineer A's response. Had Engineer A escalated formally in writing to firm leadership upon Supervisor B's initial alteration request, several outcomes become plausible: senior leadership might have overruled Supervisor B; legal counsel might have recognized the firm's exposure and blocked submission; or the firm's refusal to act on the escalation would have provided Engineer A with clear documentation of institutional complicity, strengthening his subsequent reports to the licensing board and enforcement authorities. The failure to exhaust internal escalation before the reports were submitted does not eliminate Engineer A's later obligations, but it does suggest that a more proactive response at the earliest stage — treating Supervisor B's request as a formal professional crisis requiring immediate institutional response, not merely a supervisory disagreement — would have been both ethically superior and practically more effective.
In response to Q403, had XYZ Engineering employed a licensed professional engineer as Supervisor B's superior — or as Supervisor B's replacement in the supervisory role over Engineer A — the chain of authority over sealed reports would have been structured in conformity with professional engineering standards, which require that engineering judgments be reviewed and overruled, if at all, only by licensed engineers with the technical competence to do so. A licensed PE supervisor would have been bound by the same NSPE Code obligations as Engineer A, including the prohibition on approving documents not in conformity with applicable standards (II.1.b) and the duty to hold paramount public welfare (I.1). While the presence of a licensed supervisor would not have guaranteed ethical conduct, it would have created a professional accountability structure in which any attempt to alter sealed reports would itself constitute a licensable offense subject to board discipline — a deterrent absent when the alteration is performed by a non-engineer principal operating outside the licensure system. This counterfactual highlights a structural vulnerability in engineering firms where non-engineer principals exercise de facto authority over licensed engineers' sealed work products.
In response to Q404, immediate resignation from XYZ Engineering upon discovering the alteration — without taking any additional corrective steps — would not have constituted a sufficient fulfillment of Engineer A's professional obligations. Disengagement from a fraudulent enterprise is a necessary but not sufficient condition for ethical compliance. The Non-Association with Fraudulent Enterprise Constraint requires Engineer A to sever his employment relationship with XYZ Engineering, but it does not discharge his independent obligations as the engineer of record on the falsified sealed documents. Those obligations — to notify the licensing board, to report to enforcement authorities, to inform the affected property owners, and to seek correction of the falsified reports — exist independently of his employment status and persist after resignation. Indeed, resignation without reporting would leave the falsified reports in circulation, the property owners without recourse, Supervisor B's unlicensed practice unreported, and XYZ Engineering free to repeat the conduct with other engineers. A resignation that is not accompanied by the full suite of corrective reporting obligations would represent an ethical failure of a different kind: the use of personal disengagement as a substitute for professional accountability.
The tension between the Stamped Document Ongoing Professional Accountability principle and the Non-Subordination of Sealed Document Authority principle was resolved not by choosing one over the other, but by recognizing that they operate in complementary sequence rather than in conflict. Engineer A's accountability for his sealed reports does not diminish simply because the alteration was covert and unauthorized — the seal is a public representation of professional responsibility that survives the act of sealing. At the same time, the Non-Subordination principle confirms that Supervisor B had no authority to alter those documents. The case teaches that these two principles together create a continuous chain of obligation: Engineer A retains accountability precisely because the seal is inviolable, and that inviolability is what makes Supervisor B's alteration both a professional violation and an unlicensed practice of engineering. Engineer A cannot be simultaneously absolved of accountability and held responsible — rather, he is accountable for the document's integrity in the world, which is exactly why he must act to correct it, even though he did not make the alteration. The resolution is that covert alteration by an unauthorized party does not transfer accountability away from the engineer of record; it instead triggers an affirmative corrective obligation.
The tension between the Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Status principle and the Client Report Suppression Prohibition was resolved by recognizing that the insurance company's status as the client does not grant it any authority over the substantive conclusions of Engineer A's forensic reports. This case teaches a foundational principle prioritization rule: in forensic and assessment engineering, the client relationship is transactional and procedural, not epistemic. The client may direct the scope of the engagement, but it cannot direct the findings. When XYZ Engineering — acting as the conduit between the insurance company's financial interests and Engineer A's professional conclusions — altered the reports to serve those interests, it violated both principles simultaneously. The Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Status principle was violated because the altered reports now advocated for the insurer's preferred outcome rather than reflecting objective technical findings. The Client Report Suppression Prohibition was violated because the true findings were effectively suppressed and replaced. This dual violation means Engineer A's obligation to the public and to professional objectivity categorically outweighs any residual duty of loyalty to the client or employer. The case establishes that when a client's financial interest is the direct cause of report falsification, client confidentiality and loyalty obligations collapse entirely as ethical shields.
The tension between the Professional Association Disengagement Obligation and the Professional Accountability principle requiring ongoing corrective engagement was not fully resolved by the Board's explicit conclusions, and this represents the most significant unresolved principle tension in the case. Disengagement from XYZ Engineering is ethically required because continued association with a firm that has committed fraud using Engineer A's sealed documents constitutes aiding and abetting ongoing deception. However, disengagement without prior or concurrent corrective action — reporting to the licensing board, notifying enforcement authorities, and potentially notifying the affected property owners — would leave the harm in place and the fraud uncorrected. This case teaches that the Professional Association Disengagement Obligation is not self-executing as an ethical remedy; it must be accompanied by, and in some respects preceded by, the affirmative corrective obligations it does not itself discharge. The principle prioritization rule that emerges is that disengagement is a necessary but not sufficient ethical response to employer fraud. Engineer A must sequence his obligations carefully: investigate and document the alteration, report to appropriate authorities, and then disengage — or pursue these actions in parallel — rather than treating resignation as a substitute for reporting. Disengagement that precedes reporting may actually impede Engineer A's access to the records needed to substantiate his report to the licensing board, making the sequencing of these obligations a matter of practical ethical significance, not merely theoretical interest.
The tension between the Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection principle and the Honesty in Professional Representations principle as applied to client confidentiality was resolved decisively in favor of third-party protection, and this resolution reflects a broader principle prioritization hierarchy embedded in the NSPE Code: public welfare obligations are paramount and cannot be subordinated to client confidentiality when identifiable third parties are suffering concrete, ongoing financial harm from falsified professional documents. The residential property owners are not abstract members of the public — they are specifically identifiable individuals whose claims were denied based on documents bearing Engineer A's seal. This specificity elevates the Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection principle from a general public welfare obligation to a targeted duty of direct notification. The case teaches that client confidentiality is not an absolute shield when the confidential engagement has been weaponized against identifiable third parties. Furthermore, because the harm is ongoing — claims remain denied, and the falsified reports remain in circulation — the Honesty in Professional Representations principle itself demands correction, not merely silence. Any reading of client confidentiality that would permit Engineer A to remain silent while identifiable homeowners suffer financial harm from his falsely-attributed professional conclusions would invert the ethical hierarchy the Code establishes. The principle tension here is therefore resolved not by balancing but by categorical subordination of confidentiality to public welfare when the confidential matter is itself the instrument of harm.
Across all principle tensions in this case, a unified principle prioritization hierarchy emerges: public welfare and honest professional representation occupy the apex, followed by the inviolability of sealed documents and the prohibition on unlicensed practice, followed by corrective and reporting obligations, and only then — and only to the extent compatible with the foregoing — by duties of employer loyalty and client confidentiality. This hierarchy is not merely asserted by the Code in the abstract; it is demonstrated concretely by the facts of this case, where every lower-order obligation (loyalty to XYZ Engineering, confidentiality toward the insurance company client) was rendered void by the fraudulent conduct of the parties to whom those obligations were owed. The case also teaches that the timing of ethical obligation is not discretionary: Engineer A's duties were triggered sequentially — first upon Supervisor B's initial alteration request (obligation to refuse, which he fulfilled), then upon discovering the reports had been submitted without his authorization (obligation to investigate and seek correction), and finally upon learning of the denied claims (obligation to notify authorities and affected parties). Delay at any stage after the first constitutes an independent ethical deficiency, not merely a missed opportunity. The principle synthesis this case offers is therefore both hierarchical and temporal: the right principles must be applied in the right order, at the right moment, with the right scope of action.
Covert Alteration of Engineer A's Sealed Reports
From the point at which the non-engineer principal altered Engineer A's reports through the present unresolved state requiring correction
Engineer A has an obligation to take necessary steps to seek understanding as to the apparent reversing of his findings
Engineer A's signed and sealed property inspection/assessment reports
Not yet terminated — Engineer A must require immediate correction and the falsified documents must be withdrawn or corrected
If no other information is available that would alter Engineer A's findings, then Engineer A should require immediate correction if there is an effort to misrepresent the conclusions contained in Engineer A's report
Such actions cannot be permitted to stand
Non-engineer principal's covert reversal of Engineer A's professional findings after Engineer A refused to make the requested changes
When Supervisor B — a non-licensed, non-engineer principal — directs Engineer A to change sealed forensic report conclusions from hurricane-related damage to pre-existing structural conditions without providing any factual or technical basis, what is Engineer A's immediate professional obligation?
Engineer A's immediate obligation upon Supervisor B's request to alter sealed hurricane damage assessment reports without factual or technical basis
Refuse the alteration request, document the refusal in writing to XYZ Engineering leadership, and formally notify the firm that the sealed reports cannot be modified without a factual and technical basis
Refuse the alteration request verbally and await further direction from Supervisor B or firm leadership before taking any additional formal action, treating the request as a supervisory disagreement to be resolved internally
Engage Supervisor B in a technical dialogue to determine whether any legitimate factual basis exists for the requested change, and offer to revise the report only if Supervisor B can provide documented site evidence or engineering data that Engineer A did not have access to during the original inspection
After Engineer A refused Supervisor B's alteration request, Supervisor B covertly altered the sealed reports and transmitted them to the insurance company, causing legitimate hurricane damage claims to be denied. Upon learning of this — whether through his own discovery or through contact from affected property owners — what corrective obligations does Engineer A bear, and does delay in acting itself constitute an independent ethical violation?
Engineer A's corrective obligations upon discovering that Supervisor B covertly altered and transmitted his sealed reports to the insurance company without his knowledge or consent
Upon learning of the alteration, immediately investigate the scope of changes, preserve copies of original sealed reports, formally demand correction from XYZ Engineering in writing, and concurrently notify the state engineering licensure board and appropriate enforcement authorities without waiting for internal resolution
Upon learning of the alteration, formally demand in writing that XYZ Engineering withdraw and correct the falsified reports, and escalate to the licensing board and enforcement authorities only if XYZ Engineering fails to take corrective action within a defined reasonable timeframe
Upon learning of the alteration, document Engineer A's original findings and the unauthorized nature of the changes, and report the matter to the state engineering licensure board while simultaneously cooperating with any internal XYZ Engineering investigation to preserve the possibility of firm-level correction before regulatory proceedings conclude
The residential property owners are identifiable individuals who have already suffered concrete financial harm from insurance claim denials based on falsified reports bearing Engineer A's seal. Does Engineer A bear an independent obligation to directly notify those property owners — beyond notifying the licensing board and enforcement authorities — and does any residual client confidentiality interest in the insurance company engagement limit that notification duty?
Engineer A's obligation to directly notify the residential property owners whose insurance claims were denied based on the falsified reports bearing his seal
Directly notify each identifiable property owner in writing that the reports bearing Engineer A's seal were altered without his knowledge or consent, that the submitted reports do not reflect his professional findings, and that he is taking corrective action — providing sufficient detail for the owners to challenge the insurance denials through legal or regulatory channels
Report the falsification to the state engineering licensure board and enforcement authorities with a full account of the original findings, and rely on those authorities to notify or compel notification of affected property owners through official regulatory channels rather than making direct contact that could interfere with proceedings or expose Engineer A to legal risk
Notify the property owners who have already contacted Engineer A directly — responding to their specific inquiries with a full account of the original findings and the unauthorized alteration — while routing notification of owners who have not yet made contact through the licensing board and enforcement authorities
Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal, unilaterally altered Engineer A's signed and sealed forensic reports to change engineering causation conclusions — substituting a judgment that damage was due to pre-existing structural conditions for Engineer A's finding of hurricane-related structural damage. Does this conduct constitute unlawful practice of engineering, and does Engineer A bear a non-delegable duty to report it to the state licensing board independent of whether XYZ Engineering takes internal corrective action?
Engineer A's obligation to report Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of sealed reports as unlicensed practice of engineering to the state licensing board, independent of internal firm resolution
Report Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of sealed engineering reports to the state engineering licensure board as unlicensed practice of engineering, independent of and without waiting for any internal XYZ Engineering corrective action, and simultaneously notify appropriate enforcement authorities
Formally demand in writing that XYZ Engineering withdraw the falsified reports and take disciplinary action against Supervisor B, and report to the licensing board only if the firm fails to take adequate corrective action within a defined period — treating internal escalation as the primary corrective mechanism and licensing board reporting as a backstop
Report the falsification and the firm's conduct to the state engineering licensure board while simultaneously escalating internally to XYZ Engineering's senior leadership and legal counsel, pursuing both channels concurrently to maximize the probability of prompt correction while creating an official record of the unlicensed practice
XYZ Engineering — through Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration and transmission of Engineer A's sealed reports — has engaged in fraudulent conduct that harmed identifiable third parties. Engineer A is obligated to disengage from professional association with the firm under NSPE Code II.1.d, but fulfilling his corrective obligations may require continued access to firm records. How should Engineer A sequence disengagement relative to his corrective and reporting duties, and does immediate resignation without prior corrective action constitute a sufficient ethical response?
Engineer A's obligation to disengage from professional association with XYZ Engineering upon discovering that the firm has committed fraud using his sealed documents, and the sequencing of that disengagement relative to corrective obligations
Before or concurrent with resignation, document and preserve all evidence of original reports and alterations, formally notify XYZ Engineering in writing that altered reports must be corrected or withdrawn, report to the state licensing board and enforcement authorities, and directly notify affected property owners — then disengage from employment without undue delay
Immediately resign from XYZ Engineering upon confirming the alteration and fraudulent submission, and fulfill all corrective and reporting obligations — licensing board notification, enforcement authority contact, and property owner notification — as an independent professional after departure, without relying on continued access to firm records
Remain employed at XYZ Engineering long enough to conduct a thorough internal investigation, secure complete copies of all altered and original reports, and attempt to compel internal correction through senior leadership or legal counsel — resigning and reporting to external authorities only after internal corrective channels have been exhausted or have demonstrably failed
Engineer A's professional seal on the hurricane damage assessment reports creates a continuing public representation of professional responsibility for those documents. Supervisor B covertly altered those reports without Engineer A's knowledge or consent. Can Engineer A be simultaneously accountable for the integrity of documents he did not alter and absolved of moral responsibility for the specific act of falsification — and if so, does that accountability asymmetry create an unconditional affirmative duty to correct the record, or does the covert nature of the alteration limit Engineer A's residual obligations?
The tension between Engineer A's ongoing professional accountability for sealed documents bearing his seal and his non-culpability for the covert unauthorized alteration — and whether accountability without culpability creates an affirmative corrective duty
Treat the ongoing circulation of falsified reports bearing his seal as creating an unconditional affirmative corrective duty — publicly disavow the altered versions, provide the original findings to all relevant parties, and take all available steps to correct the record, recognizing that inaction after discovery constitutes constructive ratification of the falsification
Treat the covert and unauthorized nature of the alteration as limiting Engineer A's residual accountability to reporting the falsification to the licensing board and enforcement authorities — fulfilling the corrective obligation through official channels while declining to make direct public statements about the altered reports on the grounds that doing so could prejudice ongoing regulatory or legal proceedings
Formally document and preserve Engineer A's original findings and the unauthorized nature of the alterations, provide that documentation to the licensing board and to any party who requests it — including property owners and their legal representatives — while refraining from proactive public disavowal until the licensing board has made an official determination, to avoid prejudging a matter under regulatory review
Engineer A BER 09-6 Documentation Failure
Sealed Document Modification Documentation Capability
Engineer A failed to exercise the capability to document the changes he made to Engineer B's sealed documents, taking no steps to identify or record the actual modifications made.
BER Case 09-6: Engineer A made undocumented changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents
Absence of any documentation of changes made to Engineer B's work, despite company practice requiring initialing of revision blocks
Engineer A BER Case 09-6 Document Modifier
There was no indication that Engineer A took any steps to identify and document the actual changes he made to Engineer B's work.
It was the practice of the company to require that a professional engineer manually initial the revision block of the document being revised, identifying the responsible engineer.
Engineer A BER 09-6 Management Pressure Resistance Failure
Management Pressure Resistance in Peer Document Modification Capability
Engineer A failed to resist management pressure to complete and release design documents, instead proceeding with unauthorized modification of Engineer B's sealed documents when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available.
BER Case 09-6: Management strongly encouraged Engineer A to complete work, leading to unauthorized peer document modification
Yielding to management encouragement to complete work by modifying Engineer B's sealed documents without consent rather than seeking alternatives or escalating
Management strongly encouraged Engineer A to complete his work so that all design documents could be released.
While the Board understood the frequent pressures that engineers sometimes experience due to time, financial, and other constraints, a professional engineer must act ethically, resist such demands, and act in a manner consistent with the NSPE Code of Ethics.
Engineer A BER 09-6 Peer Consent Failure
Peer Engineer Sealed Document Modification Prior Consent Capability
Engineer A failed to exercise the capability to obtain prior consent from Engineer B before modifying Engineer B's sealed design documents, proceeding without consultation despite being technically competent to make the changes.
BER Case 09-6: Engineer A modified Engineer B's sealed design documents without prior consent under management pressure to release documents for construction
Making minor changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents without consulting Engineer B, under management pressure and in Engineer B's absence
Engineer A made minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without consulting Engineer B.
Engineer A's failure to first discuss the situation with Engineer B prior to making the changes to the work was unacceptable.
Engineer A BER 09-6 Peer Sealed Document Modification Prior Consent Obligation Violation
Under management pressure to release design documents for construction, Engineer A made minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without consulting Engineer B, when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available. The Board found this unethical.
Peer Engineer Sealed Document Modification Prior Consent Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to refrain from making any changes — even minor ones — to design documents prepared, designed, and sealed by Engineer B without first conferring with and obtaining the approval of Engineer B, regardless of time pressure from management and regardless of Engineer A's technical competence to make the modifications.
At the time of making modifications to Engineer B's sealed design documents
In completing his work at the behest of management, Engineer A made minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without consulting Engineer B.
In deciding that it was not ethical for Engineer A to make minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without conferring and gaining the approval of Engineer B...
Engineer A BER 09-6 Pressure Resistance Sealed Document Obligation Violation
Management strongly encouraged Engineer A to complete his work so that all design documents could be released for construction. Engineer A, under this pressure and when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available, made unauthorized changes to Engineer B's sealed documents. The Board noted that engineers must resist such pressures.
Pressure Resistance in Sealed Document Modification Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to resist management pressure to complete and release design documents in a manner that required modifying Engineer B's sealed work without Engineer B's knowledge and consent, recognizing that time pressure and management encouragement do not justify ethically impermissible modifications to sealed documents.
At the time of receiving management pressure to release design documents
Engineer A did so when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available.
Engineer A BER 09-6 Sealed Document Modification Documentation Obligation Violation
Engineer A made minor changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents under management pressure without consulting Engineer B, and took no steps to identify and document the actual changes made, in violation of the company's practice of requiring engineers to manually initial revision blocks.
Sealed Document Modification Documentation Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to identify and document all actual changes he made to Engineer B's sealed design documents, so that Engineer B and all parties relying on the documents could determine precisely what was changed, by whom, and when.
At the time of and immediately following modifications to Engineer B's sealed design documents
{'license': 'Professional Engineer', 'specialty': 'Electrical engineering', 'competence_status': 'Technically competent but lacked responsible charge over modified work'}
Under management pressure and in the absence of Engineer B, made minor unauthorized changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents without consultation or documentation, found unethical by the NSPE Board.
{'type': 'employee', 'target': 'Engineering Firm Management BER Case 09-6'}
{'type': 'peer', 'target': 'Engineer B BER Case 09-6'}
Engineer A made minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without consulting Engineer B
Engineer A clearly did not exercise responsible charge (direct control or personal supervision) over the work in question
Engineer A's failure to first discuss the situation with Engineer B prior to making the changes to the work was unacceptable
Engineer A Client Relationship with Insurance Company
From the firm's hiring by the insurance company through the submission of the structural assessment reports
The firm was hired by a property insurance company to inspect and conduct structural assessments of residential properties damaged by a recent hurricane
XYZ Engineering's (and by extension Engineer A's) professional engagement with the property insurance company
Completion of report submission to the insurance company (though obligations persist given the fraud)
Property insurance company hiring XYZ Engineering to inspect and assess hurricane-damaged residential properties
Engineer A Competing Duties — Employer Loyalty vs. Public Welfare
From discovery that sealed reports were altered and submitted through any resolution
Those residential property owners advise Engineer A that their property insurance damage claims were denied because the signed and sealed report by Engineer A indicated that the residential property damage was due to a pre-existing structural condition
Engineer A's simultaneous obligations to employer XYZ Engineering and to the public welfare and professional integrity
Engineer A taking definitive action — reporting to authorities, notifying affected parties, or withdrawing from the firm
Property owners notifying Engineer A that their claims were denied based on the falsified version of his sealed reports
Engineer A Conflict of Interest — Employer vs. Professional Integrity
From Supervisor B's request to alter reports through the present unresolved state
Supervisor B, one of the principals of XYZ Engineering and not a professional engineer, reviews the reports and asks Engineer A to make changes to some of the reports to indicate that the residential property damage was not hurricane-related but due to a pre-existing structural condition
Engineer A's position within XYZ Engineering where employer directives conflict with professional engineering obligations
Not yet terminated — Engineer A must decide whether to report, withdraw, or take other action
Finding no factual or technical basis for the requested change, Engineer A refuses to make the changes
Supervisor B directing Engineer A to alter sealed report conclusions to favor the insurance company's financial interest without technical basis
Engineer A Duty to Report Supervisor B Misconduct to Professional Bodies
Supervisor B altered sealed reports without technical basis; the altered reports were used to deny legitimate insurance claims; no technical basis existed for the alterations.
Engineer A was obligated to report Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of sealed engineering reports and XYZ Engineering's transmission of those altered reports to the appropriate professional bodies and public authorities, recognizing that the conduct constitutes both unlicensed engineering practice and fraudulent misrepresentation.
Upon learning of the unauthorized alterations and their consequences for property owners
Those residential property owners advise Engineer A that their property insurance damage claims were denied because the signed and sealed report by Engineer A indicated that the residential property damage was due to a pre-existing structural condition.
Engineer A Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Objectivity in Insurance Assessment
Engineer A was retained by an insurance company to assess hurricane damage; his objective findings indicated hurricane-related damage in the majority of cases, contrary to the insurance company's commercial interest in attributing damage to pre-existing conditions.
Forensic Expert Honesty and Integrity in Civil Litigation Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to perform the hurricane damage forensic assessments with honesty and integrity, rendering objective technical findings based on his professional inspection rather than findings favorable to the insurance company client's commercial interest in denying claims.
The firm was hired by a property insurance company to inspect and conduct structural assessments of residential properties damaged by a recent hurricane and to determine whether the damage was hurricane-related (a claim covered by insurance) or due to a pre-existing structural condition (a claim not covered by insurance).
Throughout the inspection and report preparation process
The majority indicate that the damage was in fact hurricane-related.
Engineer A Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Objectivity in Insurance Assessment Constraint
Engineer A was retained by a property insurance company to assess hurricane damage. The insurer's financial interest was in characterizing damage as pre-existing (not covered). Engineer A's professional obligation required objective findings, not advocacy for the insurer's position.
Engineer Expert Non-Advocate Independence Constraint
Engineer A, retained by the property insurance company to conduct forensic structural assessments, was prohibited from adopting the role of an advocate for the insurer's financial interest in claim denial — his professional duty was to render objective, technically honest findings based on observed conditions, and he was constrained from altering those findings to serve the insurer's adversarial interest in characterizing damage as pre-existing rather than hurricane-related.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.3.a (objective and truthful professional statements); NSPE Code Section III.2.a (honesty and integrity); BER Case 95-5 (forensic expert objectivity and non-advocacy)
Throughout the hurricane damage assessment engagement
Engineer A Forensic Report Alteration Victim Third-Party Direct Notification
Residential property owners contacted Engineer A to report that their claims had been denied based on altered versions of his sealed reports; Engineer A's original findings documented hurricane-related damage.
Forensic Report Alteration Victim Third-Party Direct Notification Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to directly notify the residential property owners whose insurance claims were denied based on the altered versions of his sealed reports, disclosing his original findings, the unauthorized nature of the alterations, and the basis for his original professional conclusions, so that the property owners could pursue correction of the record and reinstatement of their legitimate claims.
Later Engineer A hears from residential property owners whose homes he had inspected and noted in his signed and sealed report to be damaged by hurricanes.
Upon being contacted by property owners and learning of the wrongful claim denials
Engineer A Forensic Report Objectivity and Completeness
Forensic Expert Witness Honesty and Integrity in Report Preparation Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to prepare hurricane damage assessment reports with honesty and integrity, rendering objective technical findings based on his inspection and structural assessment rather than on the insurance company client's preferred causation outcome.
Engineer A prepared objective sealed reports finding hurricane-related damage despite the insurance company client's commercial interest in finding pre-existing conditions.
Preparation of sealed reports finding hurricane-related damage in the majority of inspected properties, reflecting actual professional findings rather than client-preferred conclusions.
Engineer A visits the residential properties and, following his inspection and structural assessment, prepares a series of reports for XYZ Engineering.
Engineer A Fraudulent Firm Disengagement
Fraudulent Firm Disengagement Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize that continued professional association with XYZ Engineering — after discovering that Supervisor B had fraudulently altered and transmitted his sealed reports — constituted an ethical violation, and to disengage from that professional association.
Upon discovering that Supervisor B had altered and transmitted his sealed reports, Engineer A bore an obligation to disengage from professional association with XYZ Engineering.
Professional obligation arising from discovery that XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B's actions, had engaged in fraudulent conduct using Engineer A's sealed professional reports.
Engineer A Hurricane Case Professional Association Disengagement Obligation
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, altered Engineer A's sealed reports reversing findings of major structural damage, causing legitimate insurance claims to be denied. Continued employment by Engineer A at XYZ Engineering constitutes association with a fraudulent enterprise.
Engineer A (Hurricane Damage Assessment Engineer, XYZ Engineering)
Professional Association Disengagement from Report-Altering Fraudulent Firm Obligation
Engineer A is obligated to disengage from professional association with XYZ Engineering upon discovering that Supervisor B has altered his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports without factual or technical basis and transmitted those altered reports to the insurance company in a manner that harms residential property owners.
Under the facts of the present case, this engineering document signing and sealing process appears to have been compromised and undermined for unknown motives and intentions.
Upon discovery that sealed reports were altered and used to deny legitimate claims
Any action to subsequently modify any aspect of the engineering documents by any party who did not actually draft the engineering documents or exercise 'responsible charge' over the preparation of the engineering documents thoroughly compromises and undermines the integrity and the veracity that this preparation and approval process is intended to embody.
Such actions cannot be permitted to stand.
Engineer A Hurricane Case Responsible Charge Integrity Stamped Document Accountability
Engineer A affixed his professional seal to hurricane damage assessment reports finding major structural damage. Those reports were subsequently altered by Supervisor B without authorization. Engineer A's professional seal creates a continuing bond of responsibility requiring him to stand behind, defend, and seek correction of the technical content of his sealed work.
Stamped Document Continuing Technical Accountability Obligation
Engineer A bears continuing professional accountability for the technical integrity of his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports, including the obligation to ensure that those reports accurately represent his professional findings and to take corrective action when he learns they have been altered without authorization.
Signed and sealed engineering documents signify that the documents in question were either actually drafted by the professional engineer whose signature and seal accompany them or were prepared under the 'responsible charge' (direct control and personal supervision) of the professional engineer whose signature and seal accompany them.
Ongoing from the time of sealing the reports through discovery of the alteration and beyond
Engineer A has an obligation to take necessary steps to seek understanding as to the apparent reversing of his findings.
If no other information is available that would alter Engineer A's findings, then Engineer A should require immediate correction if there is an effort to misrepresent the conclusions contained in Engineer A's report.
Engineer A Hurricane Case Responsible Charge Non-Delegation Unauthorized Party Obligation
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, altered Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports without authorization, reversing findings of major structural damage. This modification was made by a party who neither prepared the original documents nor exercised responsible charge over the modification.
Responsible Charge Integrity Non-Delegation to Unauthorized Party Obligation
XYZ Engineering and Supervisor B were obligated to ensure that Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports were modified only by Engineer A or by an engineer exercising responsible charge over the modification, and to refrain from permitting or directing modifications by Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal who did not prepare the original documents and did not exercise responsible charge over any modification.
At the time Supervisor B altered and transmitted Engineer A's sealed reports
Engineer A Hurricane Case Responsible Charge Non-Subordination to Unlicensed Authority Obligation
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed Engineer A to alter the conclusions of his sealed hurricane damage assessment reports, reversing findings of major structural damage to findings of minor damage. Engineer A refused this direction, which was the ethically correct response.
Sealed Document Revision Non-Subordination to Unlicensed Authority Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to refuse Supervisor B's direction to alter the conclusions of his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports without factual or technical basis, recognizing that Supervisor B's status as a non-licensed, non-engineer principal did not give him authority to direct changes to Engineer A's sealed professional findings.
At the time Supervisor B directed Engineer A to alter his sealed report conclusions
Engineer A Hurricane Case Sealed Report Alteration Investigation Obligation
Engineer A prepared, signed, and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports finding major structural damage. Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, altered those reports without factual or technical basis, reversing Engineer A's findings, and transmitted the altered reports to the insurance company, resulting in denial of legitimate property owner claims.
Sealed Report Unauthorized Alteration Correction and Notification Obligation
Engineer A is obligated to take necessary steps to seek understanding as to the apparent reversing of his findings in the sealed hurricane damage assessment reports, and if no other information is available that would alter his findings, to require immediate correction of any effort to misrepresent the conclusions contained in his report.
Upon learning from property owners that his sealed reports had been altered and used to deny their legitimate claims
Engineer A Hurricane Case Third-Party Notification Obligation
Property owners' legitimate hurricane damage claims were denied by the insurance company based on altered versions of Engineer A's sealed reports that reversed his findings of major structural damage. The property owners are the ultimate victims of the unauthorized alteration and have a direct interest in Engineer A's original professional conclusions.
Engineer A is obligated to directly notify the residential property owners whose legitimate hurricane damage claims were denied based on altered versions of his sealed reports, informing them of the alteration, his original findings of major structural damage, and the basis for those findings, so that they can pursue correction of the record and available legal remedies.
Upon learning from property owners that his sealed reports had been altered and used to deny their claims
Performing an inspection and assessment of property is one of the most fundamental activities of a professional engineer. Members of the public call upon professional engineers to perform these duties because of the technical knowledge and skill the professional engineer can provide for the benefit of the client.
Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessment Engineer
{'license': 'Professional Engineer', 'specialty': 'Structural assessment / forensic inspection', 'employer': 'XYZ Engineering'}
Licensed PE employed by XYZ Engineering who inspected hurricane-damaged residential properties, prepared and signed and sealed reports finding majority of damage to be hurricane-related, refused supervisor's direction to alter conclusions without factual basis, and later learned his sealed reports were altered and used to deny legitimate insurance claims
{'type': 'employed_by', 'target': 'XYZ Engineering Firm'}
{'type': 'report_subject_affecting', 'target': 'Residential Property Owners'}
{'type': 'service_provider_to', 'target': 'Property Insurance Company Client'}
{'type': 'supervised_by', 'target': 'Supervisor B Non-Engineer Principal'}
Engineer A, a licensed professional engineer, is employed by engineering firm XYZ Engineering
Engineer A hears from residential property owners whose homes he had inspected
Engineer A visits the residential properties and, following his inspection and structural assessment, prepares a series of reports
Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessment Technical Competence
Hurricane Damage Forensic Assessment Technical Competence
Engineer A possessed the domain-specific technical competence to conduct forensic structural assessments of hurricane-damaged residential properties, differentiate hurricane-related damage from pre-existing structural conditions, and prepare technically defensible sealed assessment reports.
Engineer A was retained by XYZ Engineering to inspect hurricane-damaged properties and determine damage causation for insurance claim purposes.
Preparation of a series of sealed hurricane damage assessment reports, the majority of which found hurricane-related damage, based on personal inspection and structural assessment of residential properties.
Engineer A Insurance Assessment Objectivity
Forensic Expert Witness Objectivity Maintenance Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to maintain complete objectivity in his hurricane damage assessments despite the insurance company client's commercial interest in minimizing covered claims, reporting findings based solely on technical evidence and refusing to alter conclusions to favor the client's preferred outcome.
Engineer A maintained objective findings of hurricane-related damage despite the insurance company client's interest in finding pre-existing conditions, and refused Supervisor B's direction to alter those findings.
Preparation of reports finding hurricane-related damage in the majority of inspected properties, and refusal to alter those findings at Supervisor B's direction despite the absence of factual or technical basis for the requested changes.
Engineer A Insurance Assessment Objectivity Constraint
Engineer A was retained by a property insurance company to assess whether residential property damage was hurricane-related (covered) or pre-existing (not covered). Engineer A's professional obligation required objective findings based on technical evidence, not findings shaped by the insurer's financial interest in claim denial.
Insurance Assessment Engineer Non-Advocate Objectivity Constraint
Engineer A was prohibited from altering his hurricane damage assessment findings to favor the property insurance company's financial interest in denying claims — his obligation was to render objective, technically honest findings based solely on observed conditions and professional judgment, regardless of the insurer's implicit or explicit interest in characterizing damage as pre-existing rather than hurricane-related.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.3.a (objective and truthful professional statements); NSPE Code Section III.2.a (honesty and integrity in professional reports); BER Case 95-5 (forensic expert objectivity)
Engineer A Intentional Information Disregard Prohibition in Hurricane Assessment
Engineer A's actual findings were that the majority of residential property damage was hurricane-related. Supervisor B directed alteration of those findings to indicate pre-existing structural conditions without any factual or technical basis — a paradigmatic case of intentional disregard of material technical information.
Engineer A / Supervisor B (as directing party)
Intentional Information Disregard Prohibition Constraint
Engineer A was prohibited from intentionally disregarding or selectively omitting his actual technical findings — that the majority of residential property damage was hurricane-related — from the sealed reports at Supervisor B's direction, and Supervisor B was prohibited from causing such disregard through unauthorized alteration of the sealed documents, establishing that the prohibition on intentional information disregard applies both to the engineer directly and to non-engineer principals who cause such disregard through unauthorized document modification.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.3.a (objective and truthful professional statements); NSPE Code Section III.2.b (non-falsification); BER Case 95-5 (prohibition on selective data use)
At the time of report preparation and at the time of Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration
Supervisor B, one of the principals of XYZ Engineering and not a professional engineer, reviews the reports and asks Engineer A to make changes to some of the reports to indicate that the residential property damage was not hurricane-related but due to a pre-existing structural condition.
Engineer A Internal Escalation Exhausted
From Engineer A's refusal to alter reports and Supervisor B's unilateral action through the present
Supervisor B, one of the principals of XYZ Engineering and not a professional engineer
Engineer A's internal options within XYZ Engineering to address the falsification of his sealed reports
Engineer A pursuing external reporting to licensing board or other authorities
Supervisor B takes the reports and thereafter sends them to the client
Supervisor B, as a principal of XYZ Engineering, overriding Engineer A's professional refusal and submitting altered reports — exhausting internal escalation given that the violating party is a firm principal
Engineer A Modification of Engineer B's Sealed Documents — BER Case 09-6
From the point at which Engineer A made changes to Engineer B's documents without consultation through the Board's determination that the action was unethical
Responsible Charge Boundary Violation by Peer Engineer State
Engineer A's unauthorized modification of design documents sealed by Engineer B
Board determination that Engineer A's actions were unethical (resolved as a matter of ethical analysis, though the underlying documents may have been released)
There was no indication that Engineer A took any steps to identify and document the actual changes he made to Engineer B's work
Management pressure on Engineer A to release all design documents while Engineer B was unavailable
Engineer A Non-Association with XYZ Engineering Fraudulent Enterprise
XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of sealed reports, engaged in fraudulent conduct that harmed residential property owners; Engineer A's continued association constitutes association with a fraudulent enterprise.
Engineer A was obligated to disengage from professional association with XYZ Engineering upon discovering that Supervisor B had altered his sealed reports without factual or technical basis and transmitted them to the insurance company in a manner that caused wrongful denial of legitimate property damage claims.
Upon learning that sealed reports were altered and used to deny legitimate insurance claims
Engineer A Non-Association with XYZ Engineering Fraudulent Enterprise Constraint
Engineer A learned from affected property owners that his sealed reports had been altered to deny legitimate hurricane damage claims. At this point, continued association with XYZ Engineering — whose principal had engaged in fraudulent alteration of sealed engineering documents — became ethically impermissible.
Non-Association with Fraudulent Enterprise Constraint
Upon discovering that Supervisor B had covertly altered his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports and transmitted them to the client as if they represented his actual professional findings — thereby engaging XYZ Engineering in a fraudulent enterprise — Engineer A was prohibited from permitting the continued use of his name or continuing professional association with XYZ Engineering in connection with this fraudulent conduct.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.d (non-association with fraudulent enterprise); NSPE Code Section III.2.b (non-falsification)
Upon Engineer A's discovery that his sealed reports had been altered and transmitted with falsified findings
Engineer A Non-Engineer Principal Boundary Recognition
Non-Engineer Principal Engineering Authority Boundary Recognition Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize that Supervisor B, as a non-licensed non-engineer principal, lacked the professional authority to direct alterations to signed and sealed engineering reports, and that Supervisor B's direction crossed the boundary of permissible non-engineer firm management authority.
Engineer A recognized and refused Supervisor B's direction to alter sealed reports, demonstrating awareness of the boundary between permissible firm management and impermissible non-engineer control over sealed engineering documents.
Refusal to alter sealed reports at Supervisor B's direction, based on recognition that the direction lacked factual or technical basis and that Supervisor B lacked engineering authority to direct changes to sealed professional conclusions.
Supervisor B, one of the principals of XYZ Engineering and not a professional engineer, reviews the reports and asks Engineer A to make changes
Engineer A Non-Engineer Supervisor Alteration Refusal
Sealed Document Integrity Defense Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize that Supervisor B's direction to alter sealed hurricane damage assessment reports lacked factual or technical basis and that Supervisor B, as a non-engineer principal, lacked professional authority to direct changes to sealed engineering conclusions, and to refuse compliance with that direction.
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed Engineer A to change hurricane-damage findings to pre-existing condition findings; Engineer A refused.
Refusal to alter signed and sealed reports at Supervisor B's direction upon finding no factual or technical basis for the requested changes.
Engineer A Objective and Complete Reporting in Hurricane Damage Assessments
Engineer A prepared sealed reports finding hurricane-related damage; Supervisor B directed alterations without technical basis, which Engineer A correctly refused.
Objective and Complete Reporting Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to prepare objective, complete, and technically honest hurricane damage assessment reports reflecting his actual professional findings — which he did, finding the majority of damage to be hurricane-related — and to resist any direction to alter those findings without factual or technical basis.
During preparation and sealing of the hurricane damage assessment reports
Engineer A Obligation to Investigate and Correct Altered Reports
From Engineer A's discovery of the alteration through required correction and resolution
Unauthorized Post-Seal Document Modification State
Engineer A's professional obligation upon discovering that sealed reports have been covertly altered
Immediate correction of the misrepresented conclusions and withdrawal or replacement of the falsified documents
Discovery that Engineer A's sealed reports were altered by the non-engineer principal after Engineer A refused to make the changes
Engineer A Present Case Fraudulent Firm Disengagement
Engineer A must exercise the capability to disengage from professional association with XYZ Engineering upon discovering that Supervisor B has altered his sealed reports — recognizing that continued association constitutes complicity in the fraudulent enterprise.
Present case: XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B, altered and transmitted Engineer A's sealed reports — Engineer A must disengage from professional association with the firm
Obligation to disengage from XYZ Engineering after discovering unauthorized alteration and transmission of sealed reports
Engineer A Present Case Insurance Assessment Objectivity
Insurance Assessment Objectivity Under Commercial Pressure Capability
Engineer A demonstrated the capability to prepare objective hurricane damage assessment reports reflecting actual professional findings — reporting major hurricane damage rather than pre-existing conditions — consistent with professional obligations of honesty and integrity despite the insurance company client's commercial interest in minimizing covered claims.
Present case: Engineer A prepared objective assessments finding hurricane damage; Supervisor B altered them to serve the insurance company's commercial interest in denying claims
Preparation of signed and sealed reports finding major hurricane damage, which Supervisor B subsequently altered to indicate pre-existing conditions
Performing an inspection and assessment of property is one of the most fundamental activities of a professional engineer.
Engineer A Present Case Non-Engineer Supervisor Refusal
Non-Engineer Supervisor Report Alteration Refusal Capability
Engineer A was obligated to refuse Supervisor B's direction to alter the sealed hurricane damage assessment reports, recognizing that Supervisor B lacked professional engineering authority to direct changes to sealed engineering conclusions.
Present case: Supervisor B directed Engineer A to alter sealed reports; Engineer A was obligated to refuse
Obligation to refuse Supervisor B's direction to alter conclusions from hurricane damage to pre-existing conditions without factual or technical basis
Engineer A should require immediate correction if there is an effort to misrepresent the conclusions contained in Engineer A's report.
{'license': 'Professional Engineer', 'document_type': 'Signed and sealed professional engineering report', 'status': 'Findings reversed without knowledge or consent'}
Prepared, signed, and sealed a professional engineering report whose findings were subsequently altered without authorization, bearing obligations to seek understanding of the reversal and require immediate correction to prevent misrepresentation of conclusions.
{'type': 'obligated_to_notify', 'target': 'Report Alteration Victim Property Owner'}
{'type': 'victim_of_alteration', 'target': 'Report-Altering Non-Engineer Supervisor'}
Engineer A should require immediate correction if there is an effort to misrepresent the conclusions contained in Engineer A's report
this engineering document signing and sealing process appears to have been compromised and undermined for unknown motives and intentions
Engineer A Present Case Sealed Document Integrity Significance
Signed and Sealed Document Integrity Significance Recognition Capability
Engineer A must recognize and act upon the full professional significance of his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports — understanding that Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration thoroughly compromises the integrity of the sealing process and cannot be permitted to stand.
Present case: Supervisor B altered Engineer A's sealed reports, reversing findings — Engineer A must recognize the fundamental professional significance of this violation
Recognition that unauthorized post-seal alteration by Supervisor B undermines the veracity and integrity of the professional accountability process embodied in the signed and sealed reports
Engineer A Present Case Sealed Report Alteration Investigation
Sealed Report Alteration Investigation Capability
Engineer A is obligated to exercise the capability to investigate the apparent reversal of his findings in the sealed hurricane damage assessment reports — taking necessary steps to understand what occurred, demanding explanation, and requiring immediate correction if misrepresentation is confirmed.
Present case: Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports appear to have been altered by Supervisor B to reverse findings from hurricane damage to pre-existing conditions
Obligation to investigate apparent reversal of findings and require correction if no legitimate basis for alteration exists
Engineer A Present Case Sealed Report Detection
Sealed Report Unauthorized Alteration Detection Capability
Engineer A must exercise the capability to detect that his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports have been altered without authorization by Supervisor B — comparing original findings against the altered conclusions transmitted to the insurance company.
Present case: Engineer A's sealed reports were altered by Supervisor B to reverse findings from hurricane damage to pre-existing conditions
Recognition that the apparent reversal of findings in sealed reports constitutes unauthorized alteration requiring investigation and correction
Engineer A Present Case Third-Party Notification
Post-Alteration Third-Party Harm Notification Capability
Engineer A must exercise the capability to directly notify the residential property owners whose insurance claims were wrongfully denied based on the altered versions of his sealed reports, providing them with accurate information about his original findings.
Present case: Residential property owners had legitimate hurricane damage claims denied based on Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports
Obligation to notify affected property owners of the alteration and provide accurate original findings so they can pursue appropriate remedies
Engineer A Professional Disassociation Decision
From Engineer A's discovery that the reports were altered and submitted through any resolution of the employment relationship
Professional Disassociation Decision State
Engineer A's decision about whether to continue employment at XYZ Engineering following Supervisor B's fraudulent alteration of sealed reports
Engineer A resigning, reporting to authorities, or taking other definitive action
Those residential property owners advise Engineer A that their property insurance damage claims were denied
Engineer A learning from property owners that his sealed reports were submitted in altered form, denying their legitimate hurricane damage claims
Engineer A Public Safety Escalation After Alteration Discovery
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize that the unauthorized alteration of his sealed reports — and the resulting wrongful denial of legitimate hurricane damage insurance claims — constituted a public welfare harm requiring escalation beyond the client relationship to appropriate professional and regulatory authorities.
Upon discovering that Supervisor B had altered his sealed reports causing wrongful claim denials, Engineer A bore an obligation to escalate the matter to appropriate authorities.
Professional obligation arising from discovery that fraudulent alteration of sealed reports caused direct financial harm to residential property owners, requiring escalation to licensing boards, professional bodies, and potentially law enforcement.
Engineer A Public Safety Escalation After Falsification Discovery Constraint
Residential property owners whose legitimate hurricane damage claims were denied based on falsified sealed reports may have been left without resources to repair structurally damaged homes, creating a public safety risk. Engineer A's paramount public safety obligation required escalation to protect those owners.
Upon discovering that his sealed reports had been falsified and that residential property owners had been wrongfully denied legitimate hurricane damage insurance claims — potentially leaving them without resources to repair structurally damaged homes — Engineer A's paramount obligation to public health, safety, and welfare required escalation beyond the firm to notify the client insurer, the state licensing board, and the affected property owners, prohibiting passive acceptance of the situation on the grounds that his internal refusal had already been registered.
NSPE Code of Ethics Fundamental Canon I (public safety paramount); NSPE Code Section II.1.a; NSPE Code Section II.1.e
Upon Engineer A's discovery that affected property owners had been harmed by the falsified reports
Engineer A Public Safety at Risk — Property Owners Harmed by Falsified Reports
From the denial of property owners' insurance claims through any correction of the falsified record
Residential property owners whose hurricane damage claims were denied based on falsified engineering reports, potentially leaving them without resources to repair structurally damaged homes
Correction of falsified reports, reinstatement of claims, or regulatory intervention
Property owners notifying Engineer A that their claims were denied based on the altered version of his sealed reports
Engineer A Public Welfare Safety Escalation After Report Alteration Discovery
Engineer A learned that his sealed reports had been altered and used to deny legitimate claims; the insurance company client was the beneficiary of the fraudulent alteration, making internal escalation to the client insufficient.
Public Welfare Safety Escalation Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to escalate the unauthorized alteration of his sealed reports — and the resulting wrongful denial of legitimate hurricane damage claims — beyond the client relationship to appropriate regulatory, professional, and legal authorities, recognizing that the alteration of sealed engineering reports by a non-engineer constitutes a public welfare harm requiring escalation.
Upon learning from property owners that sealed reports had been altered and claims denied
Engineer A Refusal to Alter Sealed Reports Without Technical Basis
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed Engineer A to change findings in sealed reports from hurricane-related damage to pre-existing structural conditions without any factual or technical basis.
Non-Acquiescence to Client Safety Override Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to refuse Supervisor B's direction to alter the sealed hurricane damage assessment reports to indicate pre-existing structural conditions when no factual or technical basis existed for such a change, and did so correctly.
Upon receiving Supervisor B's direction to alter the reports
Engineer A Sealed Document Revision Non-Subordination to Supervisor B
Supervisor B directed Engineer A to alter conclusions in sealed reports without factual or technical justification; Engineer A correctly refused.
Engineer A was obligated to refuse to revise his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports based solely on the direction of Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal, who provided no factual or technical basis for the requested changes.
Upon receiving Supervisor B's direction to alter the sealed reports
Engineer A Sealed Report Alteration Detection
Engineer A possessed the capability to detect, through third-party feedback from affected property owners, that his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports had been altered without authorization to change hurricane-related damage findings to pre-existing condition findings.
Engineer A learned from residential property owners that their insurance claims were denied based on sealed reports indicating pre-existing conditions, contradicting his original hurricane-damage findings.
Recognition that property owners' reports of claim denials based on pre-existing condition findings contradicted his original sealed findings of hurricane-related damage, enabling identification of unauthorized post-seal alteration.
Engineer A Sealed Report Alteration Refusal Constraint
Supervisor B directed Engineer A to change sealed report findings from hurricane-related to pre-existing structural condition without factual or technical basis. Engineer A correctly refused, recognizing that compliance would have constituted aiding unlicensed engineering practice and falsifying professional findings.
Non-Aiding Unlicensed Engineering Practice Constraint
Engineer A was absolutely prohibited from altering his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports at Supervisor B's direction when no factual or technical basis existed for the requested changes — because complying would have constituted aiding Supervisor B's unlicensed exercise of engineering judgment over sealed professional documents and would have falsified the engineer's professional findings.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.e; NSPE Code Section II.3.a (objective and truthful professional statements); state engineering practice acts
At the time Supervisor B directed Engineer A to alter the sealed reports
Engineer A Sealed Report Covert Alteration
From the moment Supervisor B took the reports and submitted them to the insurance company through the present, as the falsified reports remain on record and property owners have been denied claims
Residential property owners whose claims were denied
Engineer A's signed and sealed structural assessment reports
Not yet terminated — falsified reports remain in effect and property owners have been harmed
Supervisor B taking Engineer A's sealed reports and submitting them to the insurance company with altered conclusions after Engineer A refused to make the changes
Engineer A Sealed Report Post-Alteration Correction Constraint
Engineer A learned from affected residential property owners that his sealed reports had been altered to show pre-existing structural conditions rather than hurricane damage, resulting in wrongful denial of legitimate insurance claims. Engineer A's professional obligations required immediate corrective action rather than passive acceptance of the situation.
Sealed Report Integrity Post-Alteration Correction Obligation Constraint
Upon learning from affected property owners that his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports had been covertly altered by Supervisor B and transmitted to the insurance company — resulting in wrongful denial of legitimate claims — Engineer A was prohibited from remaining passive or silent, and was required to take immediate corrective action including notifying the client insurer, providing corrected reports, reporting Supervisor B's conduct to the state licensing board, and directly notifying the affected property owners.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.a (public safety paramount); NSPE Code Section II.3.a (objective and truthful); NSPE Code Section III.2.b (non-falsification); state engineering practice acts
Upon Engineer A's discovery that his sealed reports had been altered and transmitted with falsified findings, causing harm to property owners
Engineer A Sealed Report Unauthorized Alteration Correction and Notification
Engineer A learned from residential property owners that his sealed reports had been altered to deny their legitimate hurricane damage claims; no technical basis existed for the alterations.
Upon learning that his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports had been altered by Supervisor B without factual or technical basis and used to deny legitimate insurance claims, Engineer A was obligated to take affirmative corrective action — including notifying the affected property owners, the insurance company client, and appropriate regulatory authorities — to correct the record and remediate the harm caused by the unauthorized alteration.
Engineer A Stamped Document Continuing Accountability
Stamped Document Ongoing Technical Accountability Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize that affixing his professional seal to the hurricane damage assessment reports created a continuing professional accountability for their technical content — including the obligation to take corrective action when those reports were altered without authorization and transmitted as if they represented his professional findings.
Engineer A's sealed reports were altered and transmitted by Supervisor B, creating a situation where the seal implied Engineer A's professional endorsement of findings he had not made.
Recognition that the seal on his reports created ongoing accountability obligations that persisted after Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration and transmission of the reports.
Engineer A Stamped Document Continuing Accountability Constraint
Engineer A signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports that were subsequently altered by Supervisor B. The professional seal created a continuing accountability obligation requiring Engineer A to take corrective action upon discovering the falsification, not merely to note that his internal refusal had been registered.
Stamped Document Ongoing Technical Accountability Non-Abandonment Constraint
Engineer A's affixing of his professional seal to the hurricane damage assessment reports created a continuing professional accountability for the technical integrity and accuracy of those documents — prohibiting Engineer A from abandoning or disavowing responsibility for the reports upon learning they had been falsified, and requiring instead that he take affirmative corrective action to restore the accuracy of the professional record.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.2 (responsible charge and seal obligations); BER Case 86-2; BER Case 09-6; state engineering practice acts governing the significance of the professional seal
From the time Engineer A signed and sealed the reports through discovery of the falsification and beyond
Engineer A Stamped Document Continuing Accountability for Altered Reports
Engineer A sealed reports finding hurricane-related damage; those reports were subsequently altered by Supervisor B to indicate pre-existing structural conditions and used to deny property owners' insurance claims.
Engineer A's affixing of his professional seal to the hurricane damage assessment reports created a continuing professional accountability for the technical integrity of those reports, obligating him to take corrective action upon learning that the sealed reports had been altered and used to deny legitimate claims.
Ongoing from the moment of sealing through discovery of the unauthorized alteration and its consequences
Engineer A Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection in Hurricane Assessment
Residential property owners were the ultimate beneficiaries of accurate hurricane damage assessments; their legitimate claims were denied based on unauthorized alterations to Engineer A's sealed reports.
Engineer A bore an obligation to protect the interests of the residential property owners — third-party claimants whose legitimate insurance claims depended on the accuracy of his forensic assessments — by ensuring that his original findings were not suppressed or altered to their detriment, and by taking corrective action when he learned that altered reports had been used to deny their claims.
The firm was hired by a property insurance company to inspect and conduct structural assessments of residential properties damaged by a recent hurricane.
From the time of inspection through discovery of the unauthorized alterations and their consequences
Engineer A Third-Party Property Owner Direct Notification Constraint
Residential property owners whose legitimate hurricane damage claims were denied based on falsified versions of Engineer A's sealed reports contacted Engineer A directly. Engineer A's professional obligations required direct notification to those owners of the falsification, not merely internal or regulatory reporting.
Sealed Report Post-Transmission Falsification Third-Party Harm Notification Constraint
Upon learning that his sealed reports had been falsified and that identifiable residential property owners had suffered direct, concrete harm — wrongful denial of legitimate hurricane damage insurance claims — Engineer A was prohibited from limiting notification to the client insurer or the licensing board alone, and was required to directly notify the affected property owners of the falsification so they could seek correction of their claims.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.a (public safety and welfare paramount); NSPE Code Section III.2.a (honesty and integrity); professional obligation to protect third parties harmed by falsified professional documents
Engineer A Third-Party Property Owner Notification
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize the professional obligation to directly notify the residential property owners whose insurance claims were wrongfully denied based on altered versions of his sealed reports, providing them with accurate information about his original findings to enable pursuit of appropriate remedies.
Residential property owners contacted Engineer A to report that their claims were denied based on altered reports; Engineer A bore an obligation to notify them of the alteration and provide accurate original findings.
Professional obligation arising from discovery that property owners suffered direct financial harm from fraudulent alteration of his sealed reports, requiring direct notification and corrective information provision.
Engineer A Unlicensed Practice Challenge Against Supervisor B
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal, directed alterations to Engineer A's sealed reports and, upon Engineer A's refusal, took the reports and transmitted altered versions to the insurance company client.
Unlicensed Practice Challenge and Refusal Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to challenge Supervisor B's direction to alter sealed engineering reports and to refuse compliance, recognizing that Supervisor B — a non-licensed non-engineer — lacked the authority, qualifications, and legal standing to direct changes to sealed engineering work product.
Upon Supervisor B's direction to alter sealed reports and upon learning of the unauthorized transmission
Engineer A Unlicensed Practice Recognition of Supervisor B
Unlicensed Practice Recognition Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize that Supervisor B's direction to alter sealed engineering reports — and Supervisor B's subsequent unauthorized alteration and transmission of those reports — constituted the unlicensed practice of engineering by a non-licensed individual exercising control over sealed professional engineering documents.
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal, directed alterations to sealed reports and then transmitted altered versions to the insurance company client after Engineer A refused to make the changes.
Recognition that Supervisor B's actions in reviewing, directing alterations to, and transmitting altered sealed engineering reports exceeded the authority of a non-licensed firm principal and constituted unlicensed engineering practice.
Engineer A Unlicensed Practice Reporting Obligation
Unlicensed Practice Reporting and Challenge Capability
Engineer A possessed the capability to recognize the professional obligation to report Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration and transmission of sealed engineering reports — constituting unlicensed engineering practice — to the appropriate state licensing board and professional bodies.
Upon discovering that Supervisor B had altered and transmitted his sealed reports, Engineer A bore an obligation to report this unlicensed practice to the state engineering licensing board.
Professional obligation arising from discovery that Supervisor B had altered and transmitted sealed reports without engineering authority, triggering reporting duties to licensing authorities.
Engineer A Unlicensed Practice Reporting of Supervisor B Constraint
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal, unilaterally altered Engineer A's sealed engineering reports — an act constituting the unlicensed practice of engineering — and transmitted them to the client. Engineer A's professional obligations required reporting this unlicensed practice to the state licensing board.
Unlicensed Practice Reporting Constraint
Upon discovering that Supervisor B — a non-licensed non-engineer principal — had exercised engineering judgment by altering Engineer A's signed and sealed structural assessment reports without factual or technical basis, thereby engaging in the unlawful practice of engineering, Engineer A was required to report Supervisor B's conduct to the state engineering licensing board.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section III.2.e (reporting violations); state engineering practice acts prohibiting unlicensed practice; professional obligation to report unlicensed practice
Upon Engineer A's discovery that Supervisor B had altered and transmitted the falsified sealed reports
Engineer A Unlicensed Practice Reporting of Supervisor B to Licensing Board
Supervisor B, a non-engineer, altered Engineer A's sealed reports and transmitted them to the insurance company, effectively substituting non-engineer commercial judgment for Engineer A's professional engineering findings.
Unlicensed Practice Reporting to Professional Bodies Obligation
Engineer A was obligated to report Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration and transmission of sealed engineering reports — acts constituting the unlicensed practice of engineering — to the state engineering licensure board and appropriate professional bodies.
Upon learning that Supervisor B had altered and transmitted the sealed reports and that property owners' claims had been denied based on the altered reports
Engineer A preparing reports before Engineer A signing and sealing reports
Engineer A refusing to make changes before Supervisor B sending reports to insurance company
Engineer A signing and sealing reports before Supervisor B reviewing the reports
Engineer A's inspection and original findings before apparent falsification of sealed reports
Engineer A's property inspections before Engineer A preparing reports
{'license': 'Professional Engineer', 'specialty': 'Electrical engineering', 'status': 'Unavailable when unauthorized modifications were made'}
Prepared, designed, and sealed design documents for an assigned scope of a shared project; had documents modified without knowledge or consent by Engineer A under management pressure.
{'type': 'peer', 'target': 'Engineer A BER Case 09-6 Document Modifier'}
Engineer B prepared, designed, and sealed the design documents for which she was responsible
when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available
Engineer Public Safety Escalation Standard - Third-Party Harm Context
Professional engineering community / NSPE
Professional Norms Governing Engineer Duty to Escalate When Third Parties Are Harmed by Altered Reports
Engineer Public Safety Escalation Standard
Later Engineer A hears from residential property owners whose homes he had inspected and noted in his signed and sealed report to be damaged by hurricanes
Engineer A in determining escalation obligations after discovering the harm to property owners
Grounds Engineer A's obligation to escalate beyond the firm and client to notify regulatory authorities, the state licensing board, and affected property owners when he discovers that his sealed reports were altered and used to wrongfully deny insurance claims.
Engineer Reporting Obligation to Licensing Board Standard - Report Falsification
State Licensing Board Rules Governing Reporting of Professional Conduct Violations
Engineer Reporting Obligation to Licensing Board Standard
Engineer A in determining reporting obligations to the state licensing board
Establishes Engineer A's affirmative duty to report to the state licensing board the unauthorized alteration of his sealed reports by Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal, constituting a violation of professional conduct rules and potentially unlicensed practice of engineering.
Engineer Stamped Document Responsibility Standard
Professional Norms Governing Engineer Responsibility for Stamped Documents
Engineer A upon learning that his sealed reports were altered and used to deny insurance claims
Establishes Engineer A's ongoing professional responsibility for the reports he signed and sealed, including the duty to take corrective action when he discovers those reports have been altered and submitted under his seal with findings he did not make.
Engineering Firm Management BER Case 09-6
{'license': 'Not specified', 'authority': 'Management authority over project release schedule'}
Strongly encouraged Engineer A to complete work and release design documents, creating management pressure that led to unauthorized modification of Engineer B's sealed documents; analogous to supervisory pressure that compromises engineering document integrity.
{'type': 'employer', 'target': 'Engineer A BER Case 09-6 Document Modifier'}
{'type': 'employer', 'target': 'Engineer B BER Case 09-6 Document Owner'}
Management strongly encouraged Engineer A to complete his work so that all design documents could be released
In completing his work at the behest of management, Engineer A made minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B
Professional engineering community / NSPE BER
Responsible Charge / Direct Control and Personal Supervision Standard
were prepared under the 'responsible charge' (direct control and personal supervision) of the professional engineer whose signature and seal accompany them
NSPE Board of Ethical Review in articulating the standard for sealing engineering documents
Referenced to define the meaning of 'responsible charge' as direct control and personal supervision, establishing the threshold that must be met before an engineer may sign and seal documents prepared by others
Forensic Engineering Report Integrity Standard - Insurance Assessment Context
Professional Norms Governing Accuracy and Integrity of Engineering Assessment Reports
Forensic Engineering Report Integrity Standard
Engineer A and ethical reviewers analyzing the obligations arising from the altered reports
Establishes that engineering assessment reports must accurately reflect the engineer's findings and may not be altered to serve the financial interests of the retaining party, and that the engineer has a duty to disclose and correct inaccuracies when discovered.
Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Status Violated by XYZ Engineering
Property insurance company client relationship
XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B's alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports, transformed Engineer A's objective forensic assessments into advocacy documents for the insurance company's claim-denial position — violating the principle that forensic engineers are not advocates for the retaining party and must not selectively alter findings to serve the client's commercial interests
The insurance forensic context, while not strictly litigation, involves the same non-advocate obligation: Engineer A's role was to provide objective technical findings about damage causation, not to advocate for the insurer's preferred outcome of claim denial
Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Status in Civil Litigation
The non-advocate status of forensic engineers is absolute; the insurer's commercial interest in claim denial does not authorize the transformation of objective findings into advocacy through unauthorized alteration
Honesty in Professional Representations Invoked Against Alteration of Damage Findings
The alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports to reverse findings of major structural damage — without factual or technical basis — constitutes a misrepresentation of Engineer A's professional conclusions and violates the honesty obligation that underlies the professional certification process
Honesty in professional representations requires that sealed engineering documents accurately reflect the engineer's actual findings; alterations that reverse findings without basis are inherently dishonest representations
Honesty and professional integrity obligations are non-negotiable; client or employer interests in a particular outcome do not justify misrepresentation of professional findings
Honesty in Professional Representations Violated by XYZ Engineering
Hurricane damage assessment reports transmitted to insurance company
XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B's alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports, transmitted to the insurance company reports that falsely represented the cause of hurricane damage as pre-existing structural conditions — a material misrepresentation of professional engineering findings that violated the principle of honesty in professional representations
The transmission of altered reports bearing Engineer A's seal constitutes a false professional representation — the reports purport to reflect Engineer A's professional findings but in fact reflect Supervisor B's commercially motivated alterations without technical basis
Honesty in professional representations is non-negotiable; no client or employer interest justifies transmitting falsified engineering findings under a licensed engineer's seal
Insurance Assessment Engineer Non-Advocate Objectivity Constraint — Engineer A Hurricane Assessments
Engineer A performed hurricane damage assessments for a property insurance company; Supervisor B directed alteration of findings to indicate pre-existing damage rather than storm-related damage, serving the insurer's financial interest in denying claims
Engineer A was required to render objective, technically honest hurricane damage assessment findings based solely on observed conditions and professional judgment — prohibiting any alteration of findings to favor the insurer's financial interest in characterizing damage as pre-existing rather than storm-related when the technical evidence supported storm-related causation.
NSPE Code of Ethics; forensic engineering professional standards
Throughout the performance of hurricane damage assessments for the property insurance company
Members of the public call upon professional engineers to perform these duties because of the technical knowledge and skill the professional engineer can provide for the benefit of the client.
Insurance Claim Engineering Assessment Integrity Standard
Performing an inspection and assessment of property is one of the most fundamental activities of a professional engineer
NSPE Board of Ethical Review in analyzing Engineer A's obligations after discovering his sealed report was altered
Applied to establish Engineer A's obligation to provide an objective and unbiased assessment of property damage and to resist alteration of findings to favor the retaining insurer's financial interests, grounding the duty to seek correction of the reversed findings
Insurance Claims Denied Based on Altered Reports
Management Pressure Responsible Charge Non-Bypass Constraint — Engineer A BER 09-6
Management strongly encouraged Engineer A to complete his work so all design documents could be released; Engineer A complied by making changes to Engineer B's sealed documents without consultation when Engineer B was unavailable
Management Pressure Responsible Charge Non-Bypass Constraint
Engineer A was prohibited from bypassing the requirement to confer with and obtain Engineer B's approval before modifying Engineer B's sealed documents, even under management pressure to complete and release all design documents for construction — establishing that time pressure and management encouragement do not constitute justification for deviating from responsible charge and peer consent requirements.
During the project revision phase when management pressure prompted Engineer A to complete and release all design documents
Management Schedule Pressure on Engineer A — BER Case 09-6
From management's strong encouragement through Engineer A's decision to modify Engineer B's documents without consultation
Management Pressure Responsible Charge Bypass State
Management's encouragement of Engineer A to complete and release design documents under time pressure
Engineer A's completion of the modifications and release of documents (pressure resolved through ethically impermissible action)
Engineer A did so when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available
While the Board understood the frequent pressures that engineers sometimes experience due to time, financial, and other constraints, a professional engineer must act ethically, resist such demands, and act in a manner consistent with the NSPE Code of Ethics
Project schedule pressure and Engineer B's unavailability creating organizational pressure on Engineer A to release all documents
NSPE Code of Ethics - Fundamental Canon on Public Safety and Honest Conduct
National Society of Professional Engineers
Engineer A in refusing to alter reports and in determining obligations upon discovering the alteration
Grounds Engineer A's obligation to hold paramount the safety, health, and welfare of the public, to act in an honest manner, and to refuse to alter reports without factual or technical basis; also grounds the obligation to take corrective action upon discovering the unauthorized alteration of sealed reports.
the Board found it difficult to square Engineer A's actions with the language of the NSPE Code of Ethics
a professional engineer must act ethically, resist such demands, and act in a manner consistent with the NSPE Code of Ethics
NSPE Board of Ethical Review in analyzing Engineer A's obligations
Referenced as the primary normative authority governing engineer obligations regarding signing, sealing, responsible charge, and the integrity of engineering documents; cited as the standard against which Engineer A's conduct is measured
Non-Aiding Unlicensed Practice Constraint — Supervisor B Report Alteration
Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal, directed Engineer A to alter sealed hurricane damage assessment reports and subsequently altered them unilaterally when Engineer A refused, constituting unlicensed practice of engineering
Engineer A was absolutely prohibited from acquiescing in, facilitating, or remaining silent about Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of his sealed engineering reports — acts constituting the unlicensed practice of engineering — and was required to refuse compliance with any direction to alter his findings without factual or technical basis, regardless of Supervisor B's institutional authority as a firm principal.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.e; state engineering practice acts
From the moment Supervisor B directed alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports through Engineer A's discovery of the unauthorized alterations
Non-Association with Fraudulent Enterprise Constraint — XYZ Engineering
XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B's unauthorized alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports, transmitted falsified professional documents to the insurance company client, causing denial of legitimate hurricane damage claims by residential property owners
Engineer A was prohibited from permitting the use of his name or continuing professional association with XYZ Engineering upon discovering that Supervisor B had altered his sealed reports and that XYZ Engineering had transmitted those falsified reports to the insurance company client — constituting a fraudulent and dishonest enterprise — regardless of employment or financial considerations.
From the moment Engineer A discovered that his sealed reports had been falsified and transmitted by XYZ Engineering
Non-Engineer Firm Management Prohibition Violated by Supervisor B
Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, exercised operational control over sealed engineering reports by taking them after Engineer A's refusal and sending altered versions to the client — substituting non-engineer commercial judgment for licensed engineering judgment in a manner that circumvents the public protection rationale of engineering licensure
Supervisor B's action of taking sealed reports and transmitting altered versions to the client constitutes non-engineer management control that enables circumvention of licensed engineering oversight, violating the principle that non-engineers cannot substitute their judgment for that of the licensed engineer of record
Non-Engineer Firm Management Prohibition
The prohibition on non-engineer management control of sealed engineering documents is absolute and cannot be overridden by client or business interests
Supervisor B, one of the principals of XYZ Engineering and not a professional engineer, reviews the reports and asks Engineer A to make changes to some of the reports.
Non-Engineer Principal Report Falsification Direction — Present Case
From the principal's initial request to change findings through the covert alteration of the sealed reports
Under the facts of the present case, this engineering document signing and sealing process appears to have been compromised and undermined for unknown motives and intentions
Non-Engineer Principal Report Falsification Direction State
Non-engineer principal's direction to alter Engineer A's sealed inspection reports
Not yet terminated — the falsified documents remain in circulation
Any action to subsequently modify any aspect of the engineering documents by any party who did not actually draft the engineering documents or exercise 'responsible charge' over the preparation of the engineering documents thoroughly compromises and undermines the integrity and the veracity that this preparation and approval process is intended to embody
Principal's instruction to Engineer A to alter professional findings, followed by Engineer A's refusal and the principal's unilateral covert alteration
Non-Engineer Supervisor Report Alteration Prohibition Invoked Against Supervisor B
Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed Engineer A to alter the conclusions of his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports without factual or technical basis, reversing findings of major structural damage to deny insurance claims
A non-engineer supervisor lacks the professional qualifications and legal accountability that the engineer's seal represents; directing alteration of sealed findings without factual basis constitutes a fundamental violation of the professional certification process
Non-Engineer Supervisor Report Alteration Prohibition
Employer authority and client service obligations do not extend to directing the alteration of sealed professional findings without factual or technical basis; the seal's integrity is not subject to managerial override
Non-Engineer Supervisor Report Alteration Prohibition Violated by Supervisor B
Signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports
Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal, altered Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports without factual or technical basis — substituting a commercial determination (damage is pre-existing, not hurricane-related) for the licensed engineer's professional technical judgment — in direct violation of the principle prohibiting non-engineers from altering sealed engineering documents
Supervisor B's alteration of sealed reports represents the paradigmatic violation of this principle: a non-engineer with a commercial interest in a particular outcome overriding a licensed engineer's technical findings without any factual or technical justification
The prohibition on non-engineer alteration of sealed documents is absolute; no commercial or business interest justifies the alteration of sealed engineering findings without technical basis
Non-Subordination of Sealed Document Authority Invoked by Engineer A
Faithful Agent Obligation Within Ethical Limits
Engineer A correctly refused to revise sealed reports based solely on the direction of Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal, who provided no factual or technical basis for the requested changes — demonstrating that the seal represents Engineer A's personal professional judgment that cannot be overridden by unlicensed direction
Engineer A's refusal to alter sealed reports at Supervisor B's direction correctly applies the principle that sealed documents represent the engineer's personal professional judgment and legal accountability, which cannot be delegated to or overridden by non-licensed persons
Non-Subordination of Sealed Document Authority to Unlicensed Direction
The engineer's obligation to maintain the integrity of sealed documents overrides the employer's direction when that direction lacks factual or technical basis
Non-Engineer Supervisor Authority Limitation Standard
NSPE Board of Ethical Review in analyzing the conduct of Engineer A's non-engineer supervisor who altered the sealed report
Applied to establish that non-licensed supervisors or principals may not direct engineers to alter technical findings without factual or technical basis, and may not unilaterally modify sealed engineering documents, grounding the prohibition on the unauthorized reversal of Engineer A's findings
Objectivity Invoked in Hurricane Damage Assessment Findings
Hurricane damage causation determinations
Engineer A's original findings of major structural damage resulting from the hurricane represent an objective professional assessment; the direction to alter those findings to attribute damage to pre-existing conditions rather than the hurricane violates the objectivity principle by substituting the insurer's preferred outcome for the engineer's independent technical judgment
Objectivity in forensic engineering requires that causation findings reflect the engineer's independent technical assessment of the evidence, not the retaining party's financial interest in a particular outcome
Objectivity is a non-negotiable professional obligation; the insurance company's financial interest in minimizing claims does not justify directing the engineer to alter objective findings
Objectivity Principle Invoked by Engineer A in Refusing Alterations
Causation determinations in sealed reports
Engineer A's refusal to alter his hurricane damage assessment findings without factual or technical basis demonstrates the principle of objectivity — his findings reflected independent technical assessment of the damage, and he refused to substitute the insurer's commercially motivated characterization for his own objective professional judgment
Objectivity in forensic engineering requires that damage causation findings reflect the engineer's independent technical assessment of the evidence, not the client's preferred outcome — Engineer A correctly maintained objectivity by refusing to alter findings without technical justification
Objectivity is non-negotiable in forensic engineering assessments; client or employer preference for a particular outcome does not constitute a technical basis for altering findings
Peer Engineer Sealed Document Modification Prior Consent Constraint — Engineer A BER 09-6
Engineer A made minor changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents without consultation, under management pressure, when Engineer B was unavailable — even though Engineer A was technically competent to make the revisions
Engineer A was prohibited from making any changes — even minor ones — to design documents prepared, designed, and sealed by Engineer B without first conferring with and gaining the approval of Engineer B, establishing that peer engineer consent is a non-negotiable prerequisite to modification of sealed documents regardless of the modifying engineer's technical competence or the urgency of project scheduling demands.
In deciding that it was not ethical for Engineer A to make minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without conferring and gaining the approval of Engineer B.
During the project revision phase requiring modification of Engineer B's sealed design documents
It was understood that Engineer A was technically competent to make the revisions to Engineer B's work.
Pressure Resistance Obligation Invoked for Engineer A Against Supervisor B Direction
Supervisor B's direction to alter sealed report findings
XYZ Engineering Firm Employer organizational pressure
Engineer A's obligation to resist Supervisor B's direction to alter his sealed hurricane damage assessment findings — even under organizational pressure and potential employment consequences — reflects the principle that the professional seal's integrity cannot be subordinated to managerial authority
The engineer's obligation to resist pressure that would compromise sealed document integrity applies with equal force whether the pressure comes from time constraints (BER 09-6) or from supervisory direction to alter findings (present case)
Responsible Charge Integrity and Seal Authority Principle
The professional seal's integrity and the engineer's continuing accountability for sealed documents override employer loyalty and employment security concerns when the pressure is to misrepresent professional findings
Professional Accountability Invoked by Engineer A Post-Discovery
Upon learning that his sealed reports were altered and used to deny legitimate insurance claims, Engineer A bears professional accountability obligations to acknowledge the situation, take corrective action, and report the unauthorized alteration — rather than treating the matter as solely the firm's responsibility
Professional accountability requires Engineer A to take responsibility for the integrity of his sealed work even when the alteration was made by others, because the seal creates a public trust relationship that demands active defense of its integrity
Professional accountability to the public and to the integrity of sealed documents overrides any residual loyalty to the employer who facilitated the unauthorized alteration
Professional Accountability Invoked for Engineer A Corrective Action Obligation
Altered hurricane damage assessment reports
Supervisor B's direction to reverse findings
Engineer A's professional accountability for his signed and sealed reports requires him to take affirmative steps to investigate the alteration of his findings and demand correction, rather than passively accepting the unauthorized modification
Professional accountability extends beyond the moment of sealing — the engineer remains accountable for the integrity of sealed documents and must take responsibility for correcting unauthorized alterations
The engineer's continuing professional accountability for sealed documents requires active corrective engagement regardless of organizational hierarchy or employer pressure
Professional Association Disengagement Obligation Triggered for Engineer A
Supervisor B's fraudulent alteration of sealed reports
Engineer A's continued association with XYZ Engineering — a firm whose principal has altered sealed engineering reports without technical basis to serve an insurance company's commercial interests — triggers the obligation to disassociate from or compel correction of the firm's fraudulent conduct, rather than passively continuing employment
XYZ Engineering's facilitation of Supervisor B's alteration of sealed reports without technical basis constitutes a fraudulent enterprise that Engineer A cannot continue to associate with without taking affirmative steps to compel correction or disassociate
Professional Association Disengagement Obligation for Fraudulent Enterprise
The obligation to disassociate from fraudulent enterprise overrides employer loyalty; Engineer A must either compel correction of the firm's conduct or withdraw from the association
Professional Responsibility Acknowledgment Standard - Report Correction Obligation
Professional Norms Governing Engineer Duty to Acknowledge and Correct Errors and Unauthorized Alterations
Professional Responsibility Acknowledgment Standard
Engineer A in determining corrective obligations after discovering the alteration
Grounds Engineer A's obligation to notify affected property owners, the client insurer, and potentially regulatory authorities that his sealed reports were altered without his knowledge or consent and that the altered findings do not represent his professional conclusions.
Property Insurance Company Insurance Causation Determination Client
{'entity_type': 'Property insurance company', 'interest': 'Minimize covered claims by attributing damage to pre-existing conditions'}
Property insurance company that retained XYZ Engineering to assess hurricane-damaged residential properties and determine damage causation, received altered versions of Engineer A's signed and sealed reports, and denied property owners' legitimate hurricane damage claims based on the falsified reports
{'type': 'denied_claims_of', 'target': 'Residential Property Owners Report Alteration Victims'}
{'type': 'received_altered_reports_from', 'target': 'Supervisor B Report-Altering Non-Engineer Supervisor'}
{'type': 'retained', 'target': 'XYZ Engineering Firm Employer'}
Insurance Causation Determination Client
their property insurance damage claims were denied
Property Owners Discover Report Discrepancy
Property Owners Discover Report Discrepancy (Event 7) → Seek Understanding of Alterations (Action 5) → Require Immediate Report Correction (Action 6)
Public Welfare Paramount Invoked by Engineer A Hurricane Case
Residential property owners' insurance claims
Engineer A's obligation to hold paramount the public welfare — specifically the welfare of residential property owners dependent on accurate engineering assessments for legitimate insurance claims — is the foundational principle violated when Supervisor B altered Engineer A's sealed reports without technical basis
In this context, public welfare requires that engineering assessments of hurricane damage be accurate and unaltered, because property owners' financial recovery and housing security depend on the integrity of those assessments
Public welfare obligation to property owners overrides any employer or client interest in claim denial; Engineer A correctly refused to alter findings, but the principle also requires affirmative action after discovering the unauthorized alteration
Public Welfare Paramount Invoked in Hurricane Damage Assessment Context
Hurricane-damaged residential properties
Residential Property Owners Report Alteration Victims
The public welfare obligation requires Engineer A to ensure that his professional findings accurately represent the structural condition of hurricane-damaged properties, because property owners and the public rely on engineering assessments to receive appropriate compensation and to ensure safe occupancy decisions
Public welfare in the forensic assessment context encompasses both the accuracy of findings that affect third-party financial interests and the safety implications of mischaracterizing structural damage
Public welfare and professional integrity obligations override the insurance company's interest in minimizing claim payouts through altered engineering findings
What are Engineer A’s obligations under the circumstances?
At what point did Engineer A's professional obligations require him to act — upon Supervisor B's initial request to alter the reports, upon learning the reports were sent to the client without his knowledge, or only after the property owners informed him of the denied claims? Does delay in acting itself constitute an ethical violation?
Does Engineer A bear any legal or professional liability for the harm suffered by the residential property owners whose claims were denied based on the altered reports bearing his seal, even though he did not make the alterations and actively refused to do so?
Should Engineer A be obligated to directly notify the residential property owners whose claims were denied — not merely the licensing board and enforcement authorities — given that those owners are identifiable third parties suffering concrete financial harm from the falsified reports?
Is XYZ Engineering's conduct — directing a non-engineer principal to alter sealed engineering reports for the financial benefit of an insurance company client — sufficient to trigger Engineer A's obligation to disassociate from the firm entirely, and what steps must he take before or alongside that disassociation?
Does the Stamped Document Ongoing Professional Accountability principle — which holds Engineer A responsible for the integrity of his sealed reports — conflict with the Non-Subordination of Sealed Document Authority principle when the alteration was made covertly by a non-engineer supervisor without Engineer A's knowledge or consent? Can Engineer A be simultaneously accountable for a document he did not alter and absolved because the alteration was made without his authority?
Does the Forensic Expert Non-Advocate Status principle — requiring Engineer A to remain objective and free from client influence — conflict with the Client Report Suppression Prohibition when the client (the insurance company) is the very party benefiting from the falsified reports? How should Engineer A navigate obligations to a client whose interests are directly served by the misconduct of Engineer A's own employer?
Does the Professional Association Disengagement Obligation — requiring Engineer A to sever ties with XYZ Engineering — conflict with the Professional Accountability principle requiring him to remain engaged enough to investigate, correct, and report the falsification? Can Engineer A simultaneously disengage from a fraudulent enterprise and fulfill his ongoing corrective obligations that may require continued access to firm records and reports?
Does the Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection principle — protecting the residential property owners — conflict with the Honesty in Professional Representations principle as applied to Engineer A's obligations toward the insurance company client? Specifically, if notifying the property owners or authorities requires Engineer A to disclose confidential client engagement details, how should he weigh client confidentiality against the duty to protect identifiable third parties from ongoing financial harm?
From a deontological perspective, did Engineer A fulfill their categorical duty to protect the integrity of signed and sealed reports by stopping at refusal alone, or does the duty extend unconditionally to active correction and reporting once alteration is discovered — regardless of personal employment consequences?
From a consequentialist perspective, did the aggregate harm suffered by residential property owners whose insurance claims were wrongly denied — based on falsified versions of Engineer A's reports — outweigh any benefit to XYZ Engineering or the insurance company, and does that calculus impose a heightened obligation on Engineer A to pursue every available corrective channel?
From a virtue ethics perspective, did Engineer A demonstrate the professional virtues of courage and integrity not only by refusing Supervisor B's initial alteration request but also by actively pursuing correction after discovering the reports had been covertly altered and submitted — and does falling short of that active pursuit represent a failure of professional character?
From a deontological perspective, does Supervisor B's status as a non-engineer principal who unilaterally altered Engineer A's signed and sealed reports constitute unlawful practice of engineering — and if so, does Engineer A bear a non-negotiable duty under professional codes to report that unlicensed practice to the state licensing board, independent of any internal firm resolution?
If Engineer A had immediately notified the residential property owners and the state engineering licensure board upon discovering that the reports had been altered — rather than waiting until property owners contacted him — would the insurance claim denials have been reversed before causing lasting financial harm to those homeowners?
What if Engineer A had escalated the alteration request internally to XYZ Engineering's senior leadership or legal counsel before Supervisor B submitted the falsified reports to the insurance company — could that internal escalation have prevented the fraudulent submission and preserved both the property owners' claims and Engineer A's professional standing?
If XYZ Engineering had employed a licensed professional engineer as Supervisor B's superior — rather than a non-engineer principal — would the chain of authority over Engineer A's sealed reports have been structured differently, and would that have prevented the unauthorized alteration from occurring in the first place?
What if Engineer A had refused to continue employment at XYZ Engineering immediately upon discovering that his sealed reports had been altered and submitted without his authorization — would that disengagement have constituted a sufficient fulfillment of his non-association obligations, or would it still have left unmet duties to notify authorities and affected property owners?
Reports Apparently Altered by Supervisor
Reports Apparently Altered by Supervisor (Event 5) → Insurance Claims Denied Based on Altered Reports (Event 6)
{'entity_type': 'Residential property owners (multiple)', 'harm': 'Insurance claims denied based on fraudulently altered engineering reports'}
Homeowners whose hurricane-damaged properties were inspected by Engineer A, whose legitimate claims were documented in Engineer A's original signed and sealed reports as hurricane-related, but whose insurance claims were denied after Supervisor B altered the reports to indicate pre-existing structural conditions, and who subsequently contacted Engineer A to report the denials
{'type': 'claims_denied_by', 'target': 'Property Insurance Company Insurance Causation Determination Client'}
{'type': 'inspected_by', 'target': 'Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessment Engineer'}
{'type': 'notified', 'target': 'Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessment Engineer'}
Engineer A hears from residential property owners whose homes he had inspected and noted in his signed and sealed report to be damaged by hurricanes
Responsible Charge Detailed Review Constraint — Chief Engineer BER 86-2
Chief Engineer sealed plans prepared by both licensed and non-licensed engineers working under his general direction, without detailed review, due to the size of the organization and the large number of concurrent projects
The Chief Engineer was prohibited from affixing his seal to plans that he had not personally prepared or had not checked and reviewed in detail — regardless of his confidence in the abilities of those working under his general direction — because general direction and supervision without detailed review does not satisfy the responsible charge requirement for sealing engineering documents.
Throughout the Chief Engineer's practice of sealing plans within the large engineering firm
Responsible Charge Integrity Invoked in BER Case 09-6 Engineer A Modification
Engineer B's sealed design documents modified by Engineer A under management pressure
Engineer A's unauthorized modification of Engineer B's sealed design documents without consultation was found unethical because Engineer A had not exercised responsible charge over Engineer B's work and could not certify it through his own seal
Even technical competence in the relevant field does not substitute for responsible charge — the engineer who modifies sealed documents must have exercised direct control and personal supervision over the original preparation
Engineer A clearly did not exercise responsible charge (direct control or personal supervision) over the work in question, work which was either prepared or supervised by Engineer B.
The Board found that management pressure and time constraints do not justify unauthorized modification of another engineer's sealed documents, even when the modifying engineer is technically competent
Even if Engineer A had some involvement in the work of Engineer B, it was not clear whether Engineer A possessed the competence in the field involved in order to sign and seal Engineer B's work.
Responsible Charge Integrity Invoked in BER Case 86-2 Chief Engineer Sealing
Plans sealed by Chief Engineer without detailed review in large engineering firm
The Chief Engineer's practice of sealing plans prepared by licensed and non-licensed engineers under general direction — without detailed review — was found unethical because the seal falsely certified responsible charge that was not actually exercised
Responsible charge requires more than general supervisory involvement in concept and design requirements; it requires detailed review sufficient to personally vouch for the technical adequacy of the sealed documents
The Board concluded that organizational size and confidence in subordinates does not excuse the Chief Engineer from the responsible charge requirement — the seal's integrity is non-negotiable
Sealed Document Modification Documentation Constraint — Engineer A BER 09-6
The company required that a professional engineer manually initial the revision block of documents being revised to identify the responsible engineer; Engineer A made changes to Engineer B's documents without following this documentation requirement
Even if Engineer A had obtained Engineer B's consent to modify the sealed design documents, Engineer A was required to identify and document all actual changes made to Engineer B's sealed documents — a requirement Engineer A failed to satisfy, compounding the ethical violation of making unauthorized modifications.
NSPE Code of Ethics; BER Case 09-6; company revision block documentation practice
At the time Engineer A made changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents
Sealed Report Alteration Investigation and Correction Constraint — Engineer A Present Case
Engineer A discovered that Supervisor B had altered his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports to indicate pre-existing structural damage rather than storm-related damage, causing residential property owners' legitimate insurance claims to be denied
Sealed Report Alteration Discovery Investigation Obligation Constraint
Upon discovering that his signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports had been altered to reverse his findings, Engineer A was constrained to take necessary steps to seek understanding of the apparent reversal — including investigating whether any new factual or technical information existed that would legitimately alter his findings — and was required to demand immediate correction if no such information existed and the modification constituted a misrepresentation of his professional conclusions.
NSPE Code of Ethics; BER Case 86-2; BER Case 09-6
Upon Engineer A's discovery that his sealed reports had been altered by Supervisor B
Sealed Report Integrity Invoked for Engineer A Present Case Hurricane Reports
Signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports altered by Supervisor B to deny legitimate property owner claims
Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports were altered by Supervisor B without factual or technical basis, reversing Engineer A's findings of major structural damage; Engineer A bears an obligation to investigate, demand correction, and notify affected parties
The professional seal creates a continuing accountability that survives the engineer's submission of the report; unauthorized alteration that reverses findings without factual basis triggers an affirmative obligation to investigate and demand correction
Sealed Report Integrity Preservation and Unauthorized Alteration Response Obligation
Engineer A has an obligation to take necessary steps to seek understanding as to the apparent reversing of his findings. If no other information is available that would alter Engineer A's findings, then Engineer A should require immediate correction if there is an effort to misrepresent the conclusions contained in Engineer A's report.
The engineer's continuing accountability for sealed documents and the public protection rationale of the seal override employer loyalty and client direction when alterations misrepresent professional findings
Sealed Report Integrity Preservation Obligation Invoked by Engineer A Post-Alteration
Altered sealed hurricane damage assessment reports
Upon learning from property owners that his sealed reports had been altered to deny legitimate hurricane damage claims, Engineer A bears an affirmative obligation to take corrective action — including notifying the insurance company, the property owners, and the licensing board — because his seal creates a continuing professional accountability for the document's integrity
The discovery that sealed reports were altered without technical basis and used to deny legitimate claims triggers an affirmative corrective obligation that goes beyond the initial refusal to make changes — Engineer A must now act to protect the integrity of his sealed work and the property owners who relied on it
The engineer's continuing accountability for sealed documents and the public welfare obligation to harmed third parties override employer loyalty and client confidentiality when the alteration constitutes a fraud on property owners
Sealed Report Inviolability Constraint — Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessments
Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed alteration of and/or unilaterally altered Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports to indicate pre-existing structural damage rather than storm-related damage, causing residential property owners' legitimate insurance claims to be denied
Sealed Report Integrity Inviolability Constraint
Supervisor B and XYZ Engineering were absolutely prohibited from modifying, reversing, or altering Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports — which found storm-related rather than pre-existing structural damage — because neither Supervisor B nor any other party at XYZ Engineering had drafted those reports or exercised responsible charge over their preparation, and any such modification thoroughly compromised and undermined the integrity and veracity of the signing and sealing process.
NSPE Code of Ethics; BER Case 86-2; BER Case 09-6; state engineering licensure law
From the moment Engineer A affixed his seal to the hurricane damage assessment reports through all subsequent transmission and use of those reports
Under the facts of the present case, this engineering document signing and sealing process appears to have been compromised and undermined for unknown motives and intentions. Such actions cannot be permitted to stand.
Sealed Report Inviolability Constraint — Engineer A Modification of Engineer B Documents BER 09-6
Engineer A made minor changes to Engineer B's sealed design documents without consulting Engineer B, under management pressure to release all documents for construction, when neither Engineer B nor immediate management was available
Engineer A was prohibited from making changes — even minor ones — to design documents prepared, designed, and sealed by Engineer B without first conferring with and obtaining the approval of Engineer B, because Engineer A had not exercised responsible charge over Engineer B's work and it was not established that Engineer A possessed the competence to sign and seal Engineer B's work in the specific field involved.
In deciding that it was not ethical for Engineer A to make minor changes to design documents prepared and revised by Engineer B without conferring and gaining the approval of Engineer B, the Board noted that, unlike the earlier cases, the case before the Board did not involve a situation in which an engineer was engaging in areas of professional practice that were alien to his experience.
Signed and Sealed Report Integrity Standard
Signed and sealed engineering documents signify that the documents in question were either actually drafted by the professional engineer whose signature and seal accompany them or were prepared under the 'responsible charge' (direct control and personal supervision) of the professional engineer
NSPE Board of Ethical Review in analyzing the unauthorized alteration of Engineer A's sealed report
Applied to establish that signed and sealed engineering documents signify that the documents were either drafted by or prepared under the responsible charge of the signing engineer, and that any subsequent unauthorized modification thoroughly compromises the integrity of that process
Signed and Sealed Report Integrity Standard - Engineering Licensure Law Provisions
State Engineering Licensure Statutes Governing Signed and Sealed Documents
Engineer A and XYZ Engineering in understanding the legal implications of the report alteration
Establishes the legal significance of an engineer's signature and seal on professional documents, the prohibition on unauthorized alteration of sealed documents, and the legal consequences of submitting altered sealed documents to clients and third parties.
Stamped Document Ongoing Professional Accountability Invoked by Engineer A
Engineer A's affixing of his professional seal to the hurricane damage assessment reports created a continuing professional accountability for those documents' technical integrity — an accountability that persists after Supervisor B took and altered the reports, entitling and obligating Engineer A to defend the technical soundness of his original findings and challenge the unauthorized alterations
The professional seal does not merely certify the document at the moment of sealing; it creates a continuing relationship between the engineer and the document's integrity, such that unauthorized alteration by a third party does not discharge the engineer's accountability but rather triggers an obligation to correct the record
Stamped Document Ongoing Professional Accountability
Continuing accountability for sealed documents requires Engineer A to take affirmative steps to correct the altered record, even against employer interests
Stamped Document Ongoing Technical Accountability Constraint — Engineer A Altered Reports
Engineer A's sealed reports were altered by Supervisor B and transmitted to the insurance company, creating ongoing professional accountability for Engineer A to correct the falsification and notify affected parties
Engineer A's affixing of his professional seal to the hurricane damage assessment reports created a continuing professional accountability for the technical integrity of those documents — prohibiting Engineer A from abandoning or disavowing responsibility for the reports upon discovering their alteration, and requiring instead that he take affirmative corrective action to restore the integrity of the sealed documents and notify affected parties.
Ongoing from the moment Engineer A sealed the hurricane damage assessment reports
Supervisor B Non-Engineer Firm Principal Engineering Report Control Prohibition Violation
Supervisor B directed Engineer A to alter sealed reports without technical basis; upon Engineer A's refusal, Supervisor B took the reports and transmitted them to the insurance company, effectively altering the sealed professional engineering findings.
Non-Engineer Firm Principal Engineering Report Control Prohibition Obligation
Supervisor B, as a non-licensed non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, was prohibited from exercising operational control over Engineer A's signed and sealed engineering reports — including directing alterations to findings and transmitting altered reports to the insurance company client — and XYZ Engineering was obligated to ensure that such control was not exercised by non-engineer principals.
Upon Supervisor B's direction to alter reports and subsequent unauthorized transmission of altered reports
Supervisor B Non-Engineer Principal Authority Boundary Violation
Supervisor B lacked the capability to recognize the boundary of engineering authority held by non-engineer firm principals — specifically, that directing alterations to signed and sealed engineering reports and transmitting altered versions to clients constitutes unlicensed engineering practice that exceeds the authority of a non-licensed firm principal.
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed alterations to sealed reports and then transmitted altered versions to the insurance company client, demonstrating absence of this capability.
Direction to Engineer A to alter sealed report conclusions without factual or technical basis, and subsequent unauthorized alteration and transmission of sealed reports after Engineer A refused.
Supervisor B, one of the principals of XYZ Engineering and not a professional engineer, reviews the reports and asks Engineer A to make changes to some of the reports
Supervisor B Non-Engineer Principal Boundary Violation
Supervisor B lacked or failed to exercise the capability to recognize the boundary of engineering authority held by non-engineer principals — proceeding to alter Engineer A's signed and sealed reports and transmit them as if they represented Engineer A's professional findings, in violation of the prohibition on non-engineer control over sealed engineering conclusions.
Present case: Supervisor B, a non-licensed non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, altered Engineer A's sealed hurricane damage assessment reports
Directing Engineer A to alter sealed reports, and upon refusal, altering and transmitting the reports without authorization
Supervisor B Non-Engineer Report Falsification Direction
From Supervisor B's initial request to alter reports through the submission of altered reports to the insurance company and the resulting denial of property owners' claims
Supervisor B's direction to Engineer A and subsequent unilateral action on sealed reports
Not yet terminated — the altered reports remain submitted and the conduct has not been reported or corrected
Supervisor B requesting Engineer A alter report conclusions without technical basis, then taking and submitting the reports after Engineer A's refusal
Supervisor B Non-Engineer Sealed Report Alteration Prohibition
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, unilaterally altered Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports to change findings from hurricane-related to pre-existing structural condition without any factual or technical basis, after Engineer A refused to make the changes, and transmitted the falsified reports to the property insurance company client.
Non-Engineer Principal Sealed Report Alteration Prohibition Constraint
Supervisor B, as a non-licensed non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, was absolutely prohibited from altering Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports — changing findings from hurricane-related to pre-existing structural condition without any factual or technical basis — and from transmitting those altered reports to the property insurance company as if they represented Engineer A's actual professional findings.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.e (non-aiding unlicensed practice); state engineering practice acts prohibiting unlicensed practice; NSPE Code Section III.2.b (non-falsification of qualifications and findings)
At the time Supervisor B reviewed and altered Engineer A's sealed reports and transmitted them to the client
{'license': 'None — not a professional engineer', 'position': 'Principal of XYZ Engineering', 'employer': 'XYZ Engineering'}
Non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering who reviewed Engineer A's signed and sealed reports, directed Engineer A to alter conclusions without factual basis, and upon refusal took the reports and transmitted altered versions to the insurance company client
{'type': 'principal_of', 'target': 'XYZ Engineering Firm'}
{'type': 'supervises', 'target': 'Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessment Engineer'}
{'type': 'transmitted_altered_reports_to', 'target': 'Property Insurance Company Client'}
Supervisor B XYZ Engineering Non-Engineer Report Alteration Prohibition Violation
Supervisor B, a non-licensed, non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, reviewed Engineer A's sealed reports, directed Engineer A to alter conclusions without factual basis, and when Engineer A refused, altered the reports himself and transmitted them to the insurance company, causing legitimate property owner claims to be denied.
Supervisor B (Non-Engineer Principal, XYZ Engineering)
Supervisor B was obligated to refrain from altering Engineer A's signed and sealed hurricane damage assessment reports — including reversing findings of major structural damage to minor damage — without factual or technical basis, and to refrain from transmitting those altered reports to the insurance company client.
At the time of reviewing and transmitting Engineer A's sealed reports
Supervisor B requesting changes before Engineer A refusing to make changes
Supervisor B reviewing the reports before Supervisor B requesting changes
Supervisor B sending reports to insurance company before property owners' claims being denied
Supervisor Requests Report Changes (Event 4) → Reports Apparently Altered by Supervisor (Event 5)
Third-Party Affected Party Direct Notification Obligation Triggered for Engineer A
Upon learning that residential property owners' legitimate hurricane damage claims were denied based on altered versions of his sealed reports, Engineer A bears an obligation to directly notify those property owners of the unauthorized alteration and to take steps to correct the record, because the property owners are identifiable third parties directly exposed to financial harm from the fraudulent use of Engineer A's professional credentials
The property owners who contacted Engineer A have already initiated contact; Engineer A's obligation is to respond affirmatively by confirming the alteration, assisting in correcting the record, and taking steps to restore the integrity of his professional findings for their benefit
Third-Party Affected Party Direct Notification Obligation
The obligation to notify and assist identifiable third parties harmed by unauthorized use of the engineer's sealed credentials overrides employer and client loyalty when the harm results from fraud
Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection Invoked for Residential Property Owners
The residential property owners whose hurricane damage claims were documented in Engineer A's original sealed reports are third-party beneficiaries of Engineer A's professional obligations; the alteration of those reports to deny legitimate claims constitutes a violation of Engineer A's duty to those property owners
Engineers retained by insurance companies to assess property damage bear professional obligations to the property owners whose claims depend on the accuracy of the findings, not merely to the insurance company client
Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection Obligation in Forensic Engineering
The engineer's public welfare obligation and professional integrity duty to third-party claimants override the insurance company client's interest in minimizing claim payouts through altered findings
Third-Party Insurance Claimant Protection Obligation Invoked in Hurricane Assessment
Engineer A's hurricane damage assessments were used by the insurance company to deny legitimate claims of residential property owners — third parties who relied on the accuracy of Engineer A's sealed reports and who were harmed when those reports were altered without technical basis — triggering Engineer A's obligation to protect these non-client third parties
In the insurance forensic context, residential property owners are foreseeable third-party beneficiaries of accurate engineering assessments; their financial welfare and housing security depend on the engineer's professional integrity in a way that creates obligations beyond the engineer-insurer client relationship
The obligation to protect property owners from fraudulent use of sealed engineering reports overrides the client relationship with the insurer, particularly when the insurer's direction lacks any factual or technical basis
From Supervisor B's review and alteration of the sealed reports through any regulatory action
Unlicensed Practice by Third Party State
Supervisor B's exercise of engineering judgment over Engineer A's sealed structural assessment reports without holding a professional engineering license
Reporting to licensing board, regulatory investigation, or cessation of the conduct
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal, reviewing sealed engineering reports, directing changes to technical conclusions, and submitting altered reports to the client
XYZ Engineering Contracted for Assessments
XYZ Engineering Contracted for Assessments (Event 2) → Supervisor Requests Report Changes (Event 4) → Reports Apparently Altered by Supervisor (Event 5)
{'entity_type': 'Engineering consulting firm', 'client': 'Property insurance company'}
Engineering consulting firm that employed Engineer A, was retained by the property insurance company to conduct hurricane damage assessments, and whose non-engineer principal directed and effectuated unauthorized alteration of Engineer A's signed and sealed reports
{'type': 'employs', 'target': 'Engineer A Hurricane Damage Assessment Engineer'}
{'type': 'principal', 'target': 'Supervisor B Report-Altering Non-Engineer Supervisor'}
{'type': 'retained_by', 'target': 'Property Insurance Company Client'}
The firm was hired by a property insurance company to inspect and conduct structural assessments of residential properties
XYZ Engineering Firm Non-Association Fraudulent Enterprise Obligation
XYZ Engineering, through Supervisor B's alteration of Engineer A's sealed reports, has engaged in fraudulent and dishonest enterprise by transmitting materially false engineering findings to the insurance company client, causing legitimate property owner claims to be denied. Continued association by Engineer A constitutes association with a fraudulent enterprise.
Non-Association with Fraudulent Enterprise Obligation
Engineer A is obligated to refrain from permitting the use of his name or continuing professional association with XYZ Engineering, a firm whose non-engineer principal has altered Engineer A's signed and sealed professional reports without factual or technical basis and transmitted those altered reports to clients in a manner that harms third-party property owners.
Upon discovery that XYZ Engineering has altered and transmitted Engineer A's sealed reports without authorization
XYZ Engineering Non-Engineer Report Control Prohibition Constraint
Supervisor B, a non-engineer principal of XYZ Engineering, directed Engineer A to alter sealed reports, and when Engineer A refused, unilaterally altered and transmitted the falsified reports to the property insurance company client — exercising engineering judgment over sealed professional documents without licensure.
XYZ Engineering, through its non-engineer principal Supervisor B, was absolutely prohibited from exercising operational control over Engineer A's signed and sealed structural assessment reports — including directing alterations to findings, unilaterally modifying sealed documents, and transmitting altered reports to the client as if they represented Engineer A's actual professional findings — establishing that non-engineer firm principals may not exercise engineering judgment over sealed professional documents regardless of their ownership or supervisory authority within the firm.
NSPE Code of Ethics Section II.1.e; state engineering practice acts; NSPE Code Section III.2.b; professional norms establishing that sealed engineering documents may only be modified by the sealing engineer or another licensed engineer with appropriate authority
At the time Supervisor B directed alterations and subsequently transmitted the falsified reports to the client
apparent alteration of reports during period between Engineer A's refusal and report submission to insurance company
change in project scope (BER 09-6) before Engineer A making unauthorized changes to Engineer B's documents (BER 09-6)
hurricane occurrence before insurance company hiring XYZ Engineering
insurance company hiring XYZ Engineering before Engineer A's property inspections
property owners' claims being denied before Engineer A hearing from property owners