I agree story has holes but regarding

The guy who wasn't actually going to work on the issue decided the time estimate of the bug, and then expected the guy who actually worked on the issue to stick to it?

I think he meant that if the ticket was dismissed in a much shorter time than the allotted then it also needs a good reason.

I also believe a bug ticket saying “this shouldn’t happen” is not solved until until “this” no longer happens or everyone involved agrees that it’s okay for it to happen.