Is it only me getting this problem?

I've just walked into a group that has coded a heirarchy
of objects, with a locking mechanism attached to
the top level. "Lower" levels refer to this mechanism.

However, when releasing the top of the heirarchy it
seems to remove the top level first, because the lower
levels complain that they can't find it during their own
destroy methods.

Shurely shome mishtake?

Confused of England
(Mark)