CPR’s Rena Steinzor and Katherine Tracy had an op-ed in the Sacramento Bee over the weekend highlighting the reluctance of police and prosecutors to treat worker deaths as if they were anything but mere accidents. In fact, they’re often the result of illegal cost-cutting and safety shortcuts by employers, behavior that sometimes warrants criminal charges. They write:
When a worker dies because a trench collapses, and it turns out that managers sacrificed safety to get the job done faster, that’s a crime. When managers operate factories with equipment that doesn’t have an accessible emergency shut-off switch and an employee is crushed or loses a limb, those managers should be indicted. But with few exceptions, police and prosecutors treat worker deaths and injuries as unforeseeable “accidents” that can’t be prevented. So too many companies think they can save money by cutting corners and view the fines involved as a cost of doing business.
They go on to tell the tragic story leading to the death of Lawrence Daquan “Day” Davis, a temporary employee who died on his first day of work at a Bacardi bottling plant in Florida. Ignoring requirements to provide comprehensive safety training, the company sent Davis out on the line within 15 minutes of his arrival at the plant after showing him a brief safety video. Not too long later, Davis was instructed to clean up some broken bottles under a malfunctioning machine. As he was doing that, the machine was restarted, and Davis was crushed to death.
Bacardi’s only punishment for failing to provide genuine safety training before sending an employee off to do a dangerous job was a fine from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) for $110,000. As Steinzor and Tracy point out,
No criminal charges were brought against either company or their executives. Davis’ story is all too common. On average, more than 4,600 U.S. workers a year are killed on the job. These workers are parents, neighbors and friends all trying to make a day’s pay and provide for their families.
The solution, they say, is for authorities to examine such events for possible criminal behavior, rather than simply passing them on to OSHA and washing their hands. “Serious injuries and fatalities should be treated as potential crimes and examined carefully by police and prosecutors, in coordination with occupational safety officials,” they conclude.
A recent CPR manual for advocacy organizations makes a similar case, encouraging local groups to press police and prosecutors to treat workplace deaths and injuries as potential crimes.
A slightly longer version of the op-ed appeared yesterday on FairWarning, a nonprofit news organization focused on public health, safety and environmental issues.
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Matthew Freeman | June 1, 2016
CPR’s Rena Steinzor and Katherine Tracy had an op-ed in the Sacramento Bee over the weekend highlighting the reluctance of police and prosecutors to treat worker deaths as if they were anything but mere accidents. In fact, they’re often the result of illegal cost-cutting and safety shortcuts by employers, behavior that sometimes warrants criminal charges. They write: When a worker dies […]
Dave Owen | May 31, 2016
Originally published on Environmental Law Prof Blog by CPR Member Scholar Dave Owen Today, the United States Supreme Court released its opinion in US Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes, Co. The key question in Hawkes was whether a Clean Water Act jurisdictional determination – that is, a determination about whether an area does or does […]
Joel A. Mintz | May 26, 2016
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Katie Tracy | May 25, 2016
This morning, the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report finding that hazardous working conditions across the meat and poultry industry put workers at risk of on-the-job injuries and illnesses. While injury and illness rates reportedly declined in the decade from 2004 to 2013, GAO emphasizes that the decrease might not be because of […]
Matt Shudtz | May 25, 2016
Are you interested in ensuring that communities impacted by climate change can effectively adapt to changing conditions and that vulnerable populations will be protected and treated fairly in the process? Do you have a background in the legal and policy issues related to both clean water and climate change adaptation? If so, you should consider […]
Rena Steinzor | May 24, 2016
This post has also been published on The Huffington Post. Within the next few days, Congress is likely to enact the first update of a major environmental statute in many years. Widely hailed as a bipartisan compromise, legislation to amend the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA, pronounced like the opera Tosca) was made possible by […]
James Goodwin | May 24, 2016
This afternoon, the Fisheries, Water, and Wildlife Subcommittee of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee will convene a hearing on a topic that is fast becoming the congressional conservative equivalent of talking about the weather: the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Clean Water Rule. With the provocative title of "Erosion of Exemptions and Expansion of […]
Brian Gumm | May 20, 2016
With the congressional majority continuing to gut enforcement budgets, forcing federal environmental and workplace safety agencies to cut staff, criminal prosecution of corporate bad actors is more important than ever. That’s the thrust of Center for Progressive Reform Member Scholar Rena Steinzor’s commentary in the May/June issue of The Environmental Forum, the policy journal of […]
Katie Tracy | May 19, 2016
Back in March, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) finalized its long-awaited silica standard, requiring employers to reduce workers’ exposure to the toxic, cancer-causing dust so common to construction and fracking sites, among other workplaces. OSHA estimates that the new standard will prevent more than 600 deaths and 900 new cases of silicosis annually. […]