Last November, McDonald’s fired CEO Steve Easterbrook after discovering he had engaged in a consensual, nonphysical relationship with an unidentified employee. Easterbrook lost his job for violating company policies and showing poor judgment, but he was allowed to walk away with a nearly $42 million severance package because he hadn’t lied about his actions or done anything illegal.

Now McDonald’s has more to say about Easterbrook’s departure. The fast-food giant is suing Easterbrook to recoup the money, alleging that a deeper investigation determined he covered up other inappropriate activities. While the known relationship had involved texts and video calls, McDonald’s claims Easterbrook had three other physical relationships with employees, one of whom he granted generous stock options. Easterbrook tried to erase evidence by deleting explicit photos and videos of various women from his work email, McDonald’s says, but he couldn’t scrub the company’s computer servers.

The technical description for McDonald’s aggressive posture is that it wants to rip up the separation agreement and retroactively terminate Easterbrook “for cause,” meaning his conduct constituted dishonesty, fraud, illegality or moral turpitude. The cultural backdrop is more important than the legal: McDonald’s is willing to go after an already disgraced former CEO, and turn embarrassing attention back on itself, to make the larger point that bosses will be held accountable for bad conduct. “McDonald’s does not tolerate behavior from any employee that does not reflect our values,” the current CEO, Chris Kempczinski, said in a companywide statement.

McDonald’s is doing the right thing, with much of the credit going to the #MeToo movement, which is teaching corporate America long-overdue lessons about the ethics and responsibilities of workplace management. For generations, it’s fair to generalize, bosses could get away with sexual harassment and other bad behavior — or overlook misconduct by others — because victims were reluctant to confront those who sign the paychecks.