Our union is pretty strong and they were obligated to defend him. This dude also lawyered up for everything - it was like a second job for him. Anything added to his record would be challenged, amended, or argued that everyone else also did something technically similar so they should all be written up, etc. Also didn't help that he knew exactly how to piss of my boss and my boss lost his cool once and cursed him out. I think that added another 12+ months to the guy's employment since now he could argue my boss had something out for him personally.

He loved the power it gave him and he virtually scammed every system to "legally" (again, nothing obvious enough to get caught) get rewarded for it in most cases. Most organizations will eat this cost of giving in to these shitbags just to get rid of them in the moment.