The UK’s Architects Registration Board (ARB) has found a British architect guilty of unacceptable professional conduct after the architect made “a series of offensive and antisemitic comments and gestures.” The architect, Justin Rooney, was also found guilty of making “a series of inappropriate and offensive and antisemitic public posts on his Instagram profile.”

Rooney stood accused of the charges while employed at London-based GRID Architects in 2021, where he was recruited as a temporary architect through an agency. A complaint was submitted by GRID to ARB’s Professional Conduct Committee in December 2021 in relation to Rooney’s comments.

The committee accepted evidence from two witnesses who claimed Rooney said he had “joined a practice of f*cking Jews” and that he had been placed within the office “with f*cking Jewish freaks.” Colleagues also accused Rooney of telling one colleague, “F*ck off, you Jewish c*nt,” as well as telling a separate colleague, “Die Jewish c*nt.”

Colleagues also claimed that Rooney said he did not want his children to be taught by teachers of Jewish faith and that he expressed disgust at the idea of marrying a woman of Jewish faith.

In addition to antisemitic remarks, the committee accepted evidence from one witness that said Rooney raised his arm in a Nazi salute in the presence of colleagues and, on a later occasion, as he departed the office on his last day, made a similar gesture towards the same witness.

Separately, the committee accepted evidence that Rooney had ‘maliciously’ told a colleague, “you should keep quiet, it's good it makes you like you know what you’re talking about,” and “you should get different glasses, they do not suit you … those glasses make you go from your age to about 45”.

Other conduct of Rooney’s which the committee accepted as evidence were Rooney’s remark that his office was “too Eastern European” and a negative remark that London had experienced an increased rise of “Southern Europeans.” The committee also found that ‘on the balance of probabilities,’ Rooney was responsible for remarks on an Instagram account containing homophobic and antisemitic language.

In response to the allegations, Rooney admitted to making one of the antisemitic comments but denied the charge of making a Nazi salute. While Rooney did not attend the hearing, he submitted a letter which, as reported by the Architects Journal, read “I’ve been the subject of something of a targeted campaign … and this experience has made me quite intolerant. Please note I am decidedly not a racist. How my tolerance has been worn down over the years culminating with my experience in GRID is not something I believe should be the source of a formal proceedings of a consumer protecting professional body as the ARB.”

Rooney was found to be in breach of The Architects Code, which governs the standard of conduct expected of licensed architects in the United Kingdom. Rooney has now been removed from the UK’s architect register and may not apply to become a registered architect again for two years. Upon reapplying, he will also be required to demonstrate he is “fit to be registered in the light of the concerns found established” in ARB’s proceedings.