" I sincerely hope that his wealth of experience is not lost to the business for no other reason that he is made a scapegoat or that his local colleagues and managers didn't have the b@lls to handle the situation."
Erm, I can think of one other reason......
HE WAS DRUNK!
Whatever happened to personal responsibility for ones actions?
Turn up pi55ed, get caught, get hung.
Seems reasonable to me.