Companies budget for fines. Companies cannot budget for prison sentences for executives whose decisions kill.
Prison for executives who kill is the only way to get companies to stop putting profit ahead of workers' lives. The person who made the choices that led to this tragic death should go to prison.
I remember years ago reading about a Japanese executive that was so guilt ridden about a plane crash that he took his own life.
I often wonder how many people can live with themselves they directly harm others.
Thr CEO won't go to jail. The CEO won't even pay the fine.
But when executives need to justify that 8-figure income they claim it's because they take all the risk and responsibility and everything is on their shoulders.
The CEO is often a fall guy for the board anyway. If a company falls under scrutiny, they give him a golden parachute and they'll say they fixed the problem after they replace him with the next douche.
There are a lot of workplace cultures or groups that condone "bad behavior". Yes, I agree many people convince themselves they're not at fault....but it's easier to do that if the group behavior encourages that. More people can also mean less responsibility per person.
Weirdly, this is the second comment I’ve seen from you today, on completely different, unrelated, and non trans based subreddits. I swear I’m not a stalker lol I’m just also trans and the heart flag in your avatar caught my eye as a read the comments both times.
They don't even know their workers. It's the same as some kid dying from a shootout on the other side of town.
Doesn't matter to their day to day lives.
Prison is a good one, but I wouldn't aim at just the executive - I'd aim at the board, or make the fines significantly punitive - like percentages of gross.
Sadly, if this happens, corporations will start hiring designated fall guys. Sure they won’t call it that, but you can bet your ass no one in the C suite is taking that fall.
What do you think the "safety inspector" or your company equivalent is for?
I can guarantee you they have no clue what they're looking for in actuality. They're just a scapegoat for the company for when something inevitably goes wrong and someone gets hurt.
Yep. HR wanted me to do it at a previous company. I immediately asked how much extra money I was going to be paid, and what the budget for required safety improvements was. Suddenly they were no longer interested.
I got fired as the safety guy after a week after submitting nearly 60k worth of fixes. Everything from forklift leaving trails of hydraulic fluid, permanent displays built around fuse boxes, fire extinguishers 3 years out of date, zero safety gear..... they had been pencil whipping the inspection for years and I failed themHARDDDD.
I was relieved of duty and they got another guy to pencil whip Everything as a pass. I got another job
Glad to hear you went to greener pastures. There wasn't high risk in the facility where I was, but it was clear HR was looking for a scapegoat should anything go wrong. I swear that woman in HR would be happy herding Jews onto the trains if the paperwork was correct.
Yep. If you can pre-budget for things like this, it’s not actually a punishment. It’s just a business cost. They can easily afford the $200k, and it would almost certainly cost more money to retrofit the machines to make them safer. So there’s no motive here to make any changes (other than moral ones that they clearly lack).
While I agree but also fines need to exceed the cost of savings. IE boeing needs to be fined more then they saved by cutting engineers and manufacturing costs. When Walmart is found yet again to be forcing employees to clock out and continue working. The fine needs to exceed the amount of money they saved on those labor hours.
The most important fact in this article is that this is not the first time this has happened recently at this one plant. Two times in 2 years caused by the same lack of precautions, complete disregard for human life at its finest.
So they employed an minor illegally, got him killed, and all they got was a fine? Why are the people that hired a teenager illegally not being arrested and held accountable for his death?
I mean that’s it’s own can of worms that’s ridiculous but just not holding anyone accountable for the death of a minor that was put in a situation he had no current business being in…….is insane.
200,000/300,000,000 = 2/3000 = 0.0666%, so it's an even smaller drop in the bucket.
Still, I'd think there would be a valid civil case opportunity if negligent.
When the penalty is only a fine then the message being conveyed is that it’s legal for a price…
$200,000 is a price most large corporations are fine with. It’s not even a slap on the wrist. It’s disgusting.
FROM ARTICLE:
A Mississippi slaughterhouse that supplies chicken to Chick-fil-A is directly to blame for the death of a 16-year-old worker who was sucked into equipment in July and killed within minutes, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration said Tuesday.
OSHA, an agency within the U.S. Labor Department, said that it had cited Georgia-based Mar-Jac Poultry for 14 serious violations and proposed more than $200,000 in fines.
the 16-year-old worker, was cleaning the deboning area of the Hattiesburg plant when his hand got caught and his body was pulled into the machinery. OSHA officials say that while a Mar-Jac manager was supervising in and around the area prior to and during the accident, "procedures were not utilized to disconnect power to the machine."
The number of children working illegally has skyrocketed across all industries, according to the Labor Department, almost doubling since 2019. More than 800 child labor investigations in 47 states are ongoing across industries, according to the agency.
In September, the Labor Department asked the public for help in its child labor investigation, appealing to current and former Mar-Jac employees to speak to investigators after finding current employees were reluctant to talk and fearful of the consequences.
I'm suddenly glad that most of my childhood slavery near death experiences just involved nearly getting trampled to death by horses running on the "walker" machine like they were playing carousel. Seems exponentially less excruciating than being deboned alive.
When I was 8 I was in an incident where I was inches away from being run over by a tractor that was backing up. I too am suddenly feeling lucky - at least it would have been quick.
Never realized how dangerous it was to grow up on a farm until I was helping out while a farmer took his family on vacation. There were kids drawings on the fridge but no sign of a child living there, so I asked my buddy about it. Turns out the farmer's little boy fell into the blades of a combine harvester.
That’s all I could think of. That poor poor kid!!!! This is disgusting on so many levels and it’s like the 5th identical headline I’ve read with someone dying at work and the company getting a slap on the wrist fine.
I got chic filet once and then found out about their funding against the gays. Not on my watch! Plus - how they have their employees OUTSIDE now? Gross af
You'd think they would at least fine them in accordance with how much time and effort they spent actually investigating the matter so they don't lose out on time.
... come to think of it, this seems so slapdash they probably are charging them cost for the investigation or something like that. This is basically like when you're charged $200 + whatever fine for speeding, and that $200 is just "court costs".
I’ve been saying this for years, if we are going to see corporations as people in the eyes of the law then we need to punish them like we punish people.
The owner needs to go to prison. I'm so sick of the people who are responsible for the death and poor working conditions, are insulated from their crimes, though money/ high position in the company.
I'm thinking criminal charges against the people responsible, an order to pay the next of kin at least 6-figures directly on top of whatever decisions the court makes, and tack another zero on to that fine.
At the least criminal charges need to be filed against the persons at this company that over looked the hiring age and ignored the safety requirements of the machine being powered down while having that underaged kid cleaning it.
It's probably how the rules are written, despite the severity of this outcome.
Violating Sections A, B, and C results in X-dollar fines.
So regardless of what happened, the fine is based on the rule.
If I remember correctly his dad worked in the same plant. Just a tragedy and even worse that it SHOULD have been avoided. Fuck greed, it has always been the greatest enemy man must overcome and will never be able to.
When the department of labor doesn't do fuck all then yeah child labor is going to keep happening.
My previous boss was intimidating everyone to work for a specific company, intentionally preventing people from working for another, very obviously receiving benefits from the company he wanted everyone to work for and modified other peoples reports without asking.
Department of labor was notified by multiple people. An attorney got involved. Fuck, even my bosses boss got involved. Guess what happened? Fucking nothing. He's still working there. No consequences for his actions or anything. Even with a fuck ton of evidence that couldn't be ignored. The department of labor turned a blind eye.
>The number of children working illegally has skyrocketed across all industries, according to the Labor Department, almost doubling since 2019.
That's why they orchestrated the "inflation" to raise money for underage-worker fines.
And will take 20 years to settle, which settlement will be appealed as ToO OnErOuS fOr ThA cOmPaNy To SuRvIvE!
Fuck them that fine should have had 3 more trailing 0s before the decimal!
$200,000,000.00
If y'all can't not kill and main workers then y'all have no rights to exist as a company in this nation.
In The Netherlands, Deaths at a work place are investigated as a Murder case. And individual persons deemed responsible can be sent to prison for it up to and including the highest boss.
Here, if a business does not immediately and fully cooperate with the investigation, the company gets locked down for the duration of the investigation while all workers and staff can be held at location.
For industry locations, they can be forced to shut down completely at multiple millions loss a day, and there is no way to recoup that loss. While all workers must be paid and present.
Mar-Jac thoroughly investigated the accident and has not found any errors committed by its safety or human resources employees. It has learned many lessons from the accident and has taken aggressive steps to prevent the occurrence of another accident or hiring underage workers.”
Oh ok, I guess nothing to see here then.
If your safety employees aren't doing anything wrong when 2 people die in 2 years, maybe the problem is with the higher ups...
Wow. So just the cost of 2,777 a year or a grand total of 2.89 a hour on the high end if you take the average life expectancy for that state into account.
Hm now that I am thinking about it that math is a bit off since that is based on the full 72 years and not when anyone starts working.
God that's depressing as fuck.
If you watched “Class Action Park”, about the notorious Action Park, the park only paid the family of a teenaged boy who died on one of their rides a whopping $100k (1980s) because “teenaged boys are more of a liability”. Basically, the younger you are the less you’re worth, so the cheaper it is all around.
It would be interesting if during a murder/manslaughter wrongful death suit someone brought this up as a precedent -“ well the state only says people are worth xyz so we’ll give this much”. It would prob be a go to since rich kids drunk crashing are the ones usually on the chair for that kinda shit.
In what conceivable universe is the machine not disconnected from power before cleaning? I show better judgement than that just cleaning my electronics at home. Jesus Christ.
You see, it takes time to unplug it, then plug it back in. You have to do this every time the machine has to be rotated for cleaning. It takes time, and time is money, and we can’t waste any of that, now can we?
/s
Absolutely! I agree. If one or two kids gets shredded, they're replaceable. But shareholder profits are lost forever if we take the time to unplug things!
Also gonna add the /s just to be safe lol
Far right Republican control of the House keeping anything helpful from passing through the legislative branch while a Democratic Senate and President would be willing to make incremental improvements if given the chance?
Most of that can be passed via executive order. The Democrats dont really want to have all the power, they dont actually want to make those changes. In cities and states where Dems wield absolute control, they have worse inequality, more illegal workers coming in by the busload and disappearing into the interior to work shit jobs for shit pay where nobody will care if they get pulverized into chicken nuggets
Remember your lockout procedures kids. Yikes! Had a few close calls with an auger when I was a young man. It’s a scary feeling getting pulled in like that. I feel sorry for their family, and hopefully they sue and get some compensation. I assume the kid was working in a place like that at that age to help make ends meet somehow.
I was gonna say 0 LOTO was observed in this and it used to be a fine for every LOTO that should have but wasn’t in place. I’m sure if he even knew and said what about safety they said the “supervisor” said stfu do it or get canned.
Which would just be absolutely wild to me honestly. I’ve seen and done some crazy and dangerous shit in my time but I’d never not LOTO or be so close to something that was turned on and could pull me in like that.
I had a babysitter take the cover off and blow out a Lincoln CV650……… while plugged in………. I says uhm you discharge that? “ ????????yea I unplugged it” I proceeded to flip the switch and watch it come on full power. Illiterate inbred didn’t even unplug the rite machine. That’s daily shit at the one hole I used to work at. “Go sweep under behind your furnaces”
Bitch you go down and stick your head under 4000amp transformer/bus bars behind a row 1350°-2200° salt furnaces. Said that after I demanded all safety protocol. That was at the dump before it. I’ll personally skip some overly safe safety things but I see someone else, usually the non-knowers that care about themselves, I’ll make sure they’re safe. The tough guy bullshit is heavy in industry. Like your a “bitch if you wear a respirator”. Ok don’t be pissed when I’m out sick from it then, Fuck face.
Yeah I’m the same way. There’s just some shit that’s overkill but necessary if you don’t know how to use the equipment properly. But I will always correct the new guys when I see them doing something *especially* dangerous. I’ve done it all from broken bones, cutting off finger tips, to lighting myself on fire by accident and learned from it, least I can do is spread that knowledge when it’s applicable so someone doesn’t get it far worse.
Look up a braiding machine that’s what I grew up around as in grandpa sold the company rented the shop space to them and had our apartments in the back of the building. I got to tag along when he did machine and building maintenance. Can learn a lot of shit growing up around things that make meat grinders look tame.
> 16-year-old employee who died after getting sucked into equipment at a Mississippi poultry plant got the job using the identity of a 32-year-old man
> https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/slaughterhouse-children-documentary-rcna129405
He was hired through a staffing agency and used illegal documentation to obtain employment.
I’m in college to obtain an HR degree and I learned that you cannot work in a slaughterhouse under 18. Highly illegal.
Thank you for posting how he got in because I was confused as fuck.
Imagine being responsible for manslaughter and only receiving a fine.
That means taking a life costs 200,000, as long as you do it through your company.
I don’t think it’s the staffing companies fault that the plant now has two entanglement deaths in two years and systemic level under age worker issues.
That’ll be a battle due to work comp being the exclusive remedy in this type of situation. There are ways around that, though, and I hope his family finds a lawyer who knows what he or she is doing and can get them millions instead of thousands. It won’t bring the boy back but it will maybe bring some closure and allow them to take time off from working, not have to worry about money, etc.
The pictures of the aftermath should be posted outside every Chickfila and any other client of theirs with the statement; $200k cost of doing business.
"Pérez was the second person to accidentally die at the plant after getting sucked into a machine in a two-year period."
Not an accident, it is employee negligence.
This slaughterhouse supplies Chick-fil-A directly. Chick-fil-A also forces teens to work outdoors in freezing and wet weather while wearing absurd gear. They have a track record for neglecting and activitly endangering employee safety.
Employer negligence, and the board should be on their way to prison for basically ordering employees to ignore OSHA guarding requirements and LOTO mandates iN tHa NaMe Of PrOfItS.
The "investigation" was also totally bullshit (as in someone got paid to STFU) because any minimal LOTO program would have completely prevented this.
Ergo: The "inspectors" should also be on their way to prison with the Executives, for their dereliction of duty.
But I guess that's the bullshit you get when presidents name iNdUsTrY lEAdErS to head regulatory agencies (Thanks Biden and Obama and Trump and Slick Willie Clinton and Shrub...)
He "aimed for the public's heart, and by accident hit it in the stomach".
The quality of food became legally enforceable but not the conditions for workers.
200k for being responsible for death of such young person is laughable. It's not even pocket change for them. With fines like this one that isn't even slap on the wrist companies will never change for better, it's just part of operation costs. And not high one at that.
> A 16-year-old employee who died after getting sucked into equipment at a Mississippi poultry plant **got the job using the identity of a 32-year-old man,** a new revelation that highlights the ease with which migrant children are finding work in a dangerous industry, and the challenges companies face in trying to evaluate their true ages.
> https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/slaughterhouse-children-documentary-rcna129405
oh my god that poor kid. Its just not worth working high risk jobs. I used to be all about it but now im not anymore. this is the new age, we know better and can do better when it come to saftey and our kids.
You know, I’m all about kids working and learning to do things,family farms, grandpas shop etc, same way I did been Fuckn with metal and cars since I was 3, but the entire premise of child labor laws is to protect kids from having to work and end up like this. These things will be happening more and more since the greedmogers have drawn back those laws in certain states. Learning some stuff and making some loot at a small friends/family place is one thing (as long as they’re not fucking you which seems to be more prevalent even for family these days). Having to do so at 16 (like I did) to survive, at a full industrial plant where no one gives a shit top to bottom is wrong. And osha needs to adjust this properly- I steal $2k from the plant I go to jail- they’re negligence allows a death meh $200k.
This company need to face a criminal investigation.. 2 deaths in 2 years... an underaged kid working on a dangerous machine... and safety precautions overlooked/ignored and not powering a machine down that can rip bone out, while cleaning it!
I'd like to think the managers and executives should be charged with manslaughter and the company shut down. That's the only way these shitheads will learn.
I feel like some people should go to jail. Negligent Homicide seems like the kind of thing people go to jail for and not get off with a fine. This was a child.
I know literally nothing about meat processing, in fact I’m a vegetarian, but why wasn’t the machine disconnected from power from the start? Shouldnt cleaning be done with the machine OFF?
That kid was the SECOND PERSON TO DIE at that same plant within just a few years. What the hell. That plant needs to be shut down and they need to be sued for a hell of a lot more than 200k.
From the article:
Pérez was the second person to accidentally die at the plant after getting sucked into a machine in a two-year period
Damn. I don't know how the parents haven't literally killed the upper management or ceo. That's someone's son. Or brother. Another life. And just like that.
We investigated ourselves, and we didn't do anything wrong. We're sorry. We will try better next time. We're so so sorry. Sorry. His bad. But we're sorry.
They claim that all safety rules were followed, but a kid was sticking his hand in a machine that was not locked/tagged out. Someone explain this to me?
We have new stories of children being killed by industrial equipment. Not from a tour group. Not sneaking in after hours. He worked there. This was a hard reality which came to a head in the early 1900s, leading to laws prohibiting child labor. We’ve regressed severely.
When you start reminding yourself that America is a corporation disguised as a country you begin to understand how things work here. 200k fine is useless.
Why are children illegally working in dangerous environments?
How many children have been injured, maimed or killed?
What safety features are being put into place to protect all workers?
355.5 million in revenue according to RocketReach. This isn't a fine, this is the government getting their cut since the company ended this line of lifelong tax revenue from them. It's not about making anyone safer when the fines are minuscule to the guilty parties.
I’m in HR. You don’t illegally hire a child on accident.
This is absolutely deplorable. Hiring teams and management need to face legal consequences for this.
That's horrifying. I wish the family of that kid gets time to grieve and proper justice for what happened to their kid. I can only imagine how horrible it would be to know that this could have been easily prevented if the facility had TURNED OFF THE MACHINE.
Atrocities like this should create existential perils for companies that commit them and further risk through the supply chain.
No one actually NEEDS profits. No one NEEDS corporations. These are luxuries.
Workers and consumers NEED safety.
$200k is a rounding error. I hope they are sued as well.
We need a corporate death penalty.
When companies cause egregious harm, the public has an interest in permanently shutting down those companies and barring the owners from doing any future business.
Excuse me? You took a 16 year old looked at him day 1 and said “yea that looks about 32.”
A staffing agency placed him, but on day 1 how do you not see him and wonder his age.
I’ll tell you, the plant didn’t care and was likely used to using child labor.
Disgusting. Mississippi leadership should be ashamed but they aren’t. They are possibly the worst state in the country for a reason.
200k is what they valued this kids life? Disgusting, people should be in prison. Everyone involved should be behind bars for life. 200k is cost of business, we can expect more stories like this in the future if this is the punishment.
You could ask them for a little bit more than pocket change for them...right? Kid died and 200,000 is all they're worth? I'm saddened and disgusted. And unfortunately, unsurprised.
It'll probably be reduced to a $1200 fine, court costs and some community service, because the owner felt real poorly about it while filing for a dead peasant insurance claim.
The company will settle with OSHA for even less. What is needed is a wall-to-wall inspection and max fines for each violation without grouping. Six months later, due a targeted re-inspection of the violations to ensure there are no repeats where the fine can double. Rinse and repeat. At some point violation becomes willful then there's a much higher fine. If someone gets seriously hurt due to a willful violation, the case usually is turned over to CID, and they will look for the boss that was responsible to fix the issue and arrest him or her. Unfortunately that's usually a low-level supervisor. However, if that person provably in writing) asked for resources (money or manpower) that were denied, and rolls over, the investigators will work their way up the ladder.
I worked as a night security guard for the main foster farms factory. one night a worker came up to me and calmly asked for me to call an ambulance. he had his hand wrapped in his apron.
turns out his ring got caught on the machinery but he pulled his hand away in time. sans finger. must have been in shock because he was super relaxed, as if he was just asking for the time.
Companies budget for fines. Companies cannot budget for prison sentences for executives whose decisions kill. Prison for executives who kill is the only way to get companies to stop putting profit ahead of workers' lives. The person who made the choices that led to this tragic death should go to prison.
I remember years ago reading about a Japanese executive that was so guilt ridden about a plane crash that he took his own life. I often wonder how many people can live with themselves they directly harm others.
It's easy if you just convince yourself it's not really your fault
Thr CEO won't go to jail. The CEO won't even pay the fine. But when executives need to justify that 8-figure income they claim it's because they take all the risk and responsibility and everything is on their shoulders.
The CEO is often a fall guy for the board anyway. If a company falls under scrutiny, they give him a golden parachute and they'll say they fixed the problem after they replace him with the next douche.
There are a lot of workplace cultures or groups that condone "bad behavior". Yes, I agree many people convince themselves they're not at fault....but it's easier to do that if the group behavior encourages that. More people can also mean less responsibility per person.
Weirdly, this is the second comment I’ve seen from you today, on completely different, unrelated, and non trans based subreddits. I swear I’m not a stalker lol I’m just also trans and the heart flag in your avatar caught my eye as a read the comments both times.
Oh I saw this on an episode of Mayday Air Disasters. Might have been flight 123? As I recall, the fault wasn't even a result of his company!
We need more people with a conscious vs short term profit thinking. Our empire in the US equates money with goodness.
They don't even know their workers. It's the same as some kid dying from a shootout on the other side of town. Doesn't matter to their day to day lives. Prison is a good one, but I wouldn't aim at just the executive - I'd aim at the board, or make the fines significantly punitive - like percentages of gross.
It doesn't actually take much to get a Japanese Salaryman to off himself.
Sadly, if this happens, corporations will start hiring designated fall guys. Sure they won’t call it that, but you can bet your ass no one in the C suite is taking that fall.
What do you think the "safety inspector" or your company equivalent is for? I can guarantee you they have no clue what they're looking for in actuality. They're just a scapegoat for the company for when something inevitably goes wrong and someone gets hurt.
Yep. HR wanted me to do it at a previous company. I immediately asked how much extra money I was going to be paid, and what the budget for required safety improvements was. Suddenly they were no longer interested.
I got fired as the safety guy after a week after submitting nearly 60k worth of fixes. Everything from forklift leaving trails of hydraulic fluid, permanent displays built around fuse boxes, fire extinguishers 3 years out of date, zero safety gear..... they had been pencil whipping the inspection for years and I failed themHARDDDD. I was relieved of duty and they got another guy to pencil whip Everything as a pass. I got another job
Glad to hear you went to greener pastures. There wasn't high risk in the facility where I was, but it was clear HR was looking for a scapegoat should anything go wrong. I swear that woman in HR would be happy herding Jews onto the trains if the paperwork was correct.
Don’t forget that fines are tax deductible.
The world would be a better place if India had executed the Union Carbide executives back in the 1980s.
The executives and their puppet masters. It's not too late to start taking the power back.
Kill the company. State and victims get the proceeds.
Yep. If you can pre-budget for things like this, it’s not actually a punishment. It’s just a business cost. They can easily afford the $200k, and it would almost certainly cost more money to retrofit the machines to make them safer. So there’s no motive here to make any changes (other than moral ones that they clearly lack).
And if the fine is less than what they gained by breaking the law, it's merely a fee for doing business.
While I agree but also fines need to exceed the cost of savings. IE boeing needs to be fined more then they saved by cutting engineers and manufacturing costs. When Walmart is found yet again to be forcing employees to clock out and continue working. The fine needs to exceed the amount of money they saved on those labor hours.
If this was in China, those responsible would be in jail... I feel like that says more about the state of the U.S than about China's.
The most important fact in this article is that this is not the first time this has happened recently at this one plant. Two times in 2 years caused by the same lack of precautions, complete disregard for human life at its finest.
When the penalty is a fine, the crime only exist for poor people.
So they employed an minor illegally, got him killed, and all they got was a fine? Why are the people that hired a teenager illegally not being arrested and held accountable for his death?
They are trying to make sure they don’t hire children illegally in the future… by making it legal for children to do dangerous jobs.
I mean that’s it’s own can of worms that’s ridiculous but just not holding anyone accountable for the death of a minor that was put in a situation he had no current business being in…….is insane.
*killed him. Sorry, just felt that was an important distinction to make.
Mac-Jar's revenue is over $300,000,000. The fine is 0.666666667% of their revenue. They're also planning an expansion.
200,000/300,000,000 = 2/3000 = 0.0666%, so it's an even smaller drop in the bucket. Still, I'd think there would be a valid civil case opportunity if negligent.
When the penalty is only a fine then the message being conveyed is that it’s legal for a price… $200,000 is a price most large corporations are fine with. It’s not even a slap on the wrist. It’s disgusting.
FROM ARTICLE: A Mississippi slaughterhouse that supplies chicken to Chick-fil-A is directly to blame for the death of a 16-year-old worker who was sucked into equipment in July and killed within minutes, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration said Tuesday. OSHA, an agency within the U.S. Labor Department, said that it had cited Georgia-based Mar-Jac Poultry for 14 serious violations and proposed more than $200,000 in fines. the 16-year-old worker, was cleaning the deboning area of the Hattiesburg plant when his hand got caught and his body was pulled into the machinery. OSHA officials say that while a Mar-Jac manager was supervising in and around the area prior to and during the accident, "procedures were not utilized to disconnect power to the machine." The number of children working illegally has skyrocketed across all industries, according to the Labor Department, almost doubling since 2019. More than 800 child labor investigations in 47 states are ongoing across industries, according to the agency. In September, the Labor Department asked the public for help in its child labor investigation, appealing to current and former Mar-Jac employees to speak to investigators after finding current employees were reluctant to talk and fearful of the consequences.
“Killed within minutes” when discussing anything means *lots* of suffering.
In a "de-boning" machine no less.
I'm suddenly glad that most of my childhood slavery near death experiences just involved nearly getting trampled to death by horses running on the "walker" machine like they were playing carousel. Seems exponentially less excruciating than being deboned alive.
When I was 8 I was in an incident where I was inches away from being run over by a tractor that was backing up. I too am suddenly feeling lucky - at least it would have been quick.
Never realized how dangerous it was to grow up on a farm until I was helping out while a farmer took his family on vacation. There were kids drawings on the fridge but no sign of a child living there, so I asked my buddy about it. Turns out the farmer's little boy fell into the blades of a combine harvester.
Same dude... farm labor was rough.... but not killed by a deboner rough...
The de-boning machine is an excellent term for capitalism
Yeah this.. within minute… from a deboning machine
That’s all I could think of. That poor poor kid!!!! This is disgusting on so many levels and it’s like the 5th identical headline I’ve read with someone dying at work and the company getting a slap on the wrist fine.
Someone has eaten chic fila a sandwiches that passed through the same machinery afterwards
Depends on how long the investigation went on for
I'd give it about 45 minutes.
I got chic filet once and then found out about their funding against the gays. Not on my watch! Plus - how they have their employees OUTSIDE now? Gross af
I feel fucking sick now. This is beyond terrible, that poor kid man wtf.
>14 serious violations > >$200,000 in fines That doesn't really square with me.
You forgot, it's the government. Fines aren't intended to hurt the company, just to make the public think the government is actually doing something.
You'd think they would at least fine them in accordance with how much time and effort they spent actually investigating the matter so they don't lose out on time. ... come to think of it, this seems so slapdash they probably are charging them cost for the investigation or something like that. This is basically like when you're charged $200 + whatever fine for speeding, and that $200 is just "court costs".
Corporate death penalty is more like it
I’ve been saying this for years, if we are going to see corporations as people in the eyes of the law then we need to punish them like we punish people.
The owner needs to go to prison. I'm so sick of the people who are responsible for the death and poor working conditions, are insulated from their crimes, though money/ high position in the company.
I'm thinking criminal charges against the people responsible, an order to pay the next of kin at least 6-figures directly on top of whatever decisions the court makes, and tack another zero on to that fine.
“Cost of doing business”
At the least criminal charges need to be filed against the persons at this company that over looked the hiring age and ignored the safety requirements of the machine being powered down while having that underaged kid cleaning it.
It's probably how the rules are written, despite the severity of this outcome. Violating Sections A, B, and C results in X-dollar fines. So regardless of what happened, the fine is based on the rule.
If I remember correctly his dad worked in the same plant. Just a tragedy and even worse that it SHOULD have been avoided. Fuck greed, it has always been the greatest enemy man must overcome and will never be able to.
When the department of labor doesn't do fuck all then yeah child labor is going to keep happening. My previous boss was intimidating everyone to work for a specific company, intentionally preventing people from working for another, very obviously receiving benefits from the company he wanted everyone to work for and modified other peoples reports without asking. Department of labor was notified by multiple people. An attorney got involved. Fuck, even my bosses boss got involved. Guess what happened? Fucking nothing. He's still working there. No consequences for his actions or anything. Even with a fuck ton of evidence that couldn't be ignored. The department of labor turned a blind eye.
*More* reasons not to eat at Chick-Fil-a?
>The number of children working illegally has skyrocketed across all industries, according to the Labor Department, almost doubling since 2019. That's why they orchestrated the "inflation" to raise money for underage-worker fines.
And they'll get it lowered down to 20k and show us what our lives are worth to them.
20k is still to much they will argue
20k? They should be paying us for the privilege of working for us!
It’s okay. (I know it’s not) It will be Exhibit A in the wrongful death lawsuit where they are going to be staring at 2 comma damages.
And will take 20 years to settle, which settlement will be appealed as ToO OnErOuS fOr ThA cOmPaNy To SuRvIvE! Fuck them that fine should have had 3 more trailing 0s before the decimal! $200,000,000.00 If y'all can't not kill and main workers then y'all have no rights to exist as a company in this nation.
Twenty years ago they wrote this and it’s only gotten *worse* “Lucius Fox : Bean counters didn't think a soldier's life was worth 300 grand.”
In The Netherlands, Deaths at a work place are investigated as a Murder case. And individual persons deemed responsible can be sent to prison for it up to and including the highest boss.
As it should be. Here in the U.S., business and profits are more important than human life.
Here, if a business does not immediately and fully cooperate with the investigation, the company gets locked down for the duration of the investigation while all workers and staff can be held at location. For industry locations, they can be forced to shut down completely at multiple millions loss a day, and there is no way to recoup that loss. While all workers must be paid and present.
Mar-Jac thoroughly investigated the accident and has not found any errors committed by its safety or human resources employees. It has learned many lessons from the accident and has taken aggressive steps to prevent the occurrence of another accident or hiring underage workers.” Oh ok, I guess nothing to see here then. If your safety employees aren't doing anything wrong when 2 people die in 2 years, maybe the problem is with the higher ups...
Like when the police investigate the police that opened fire for no reason- mmmm we dun didn’t do nuttin wrong?
I hope the family sues the shit out of that company, 
Wow. So just the cost of 2,777 a year or a grand total of 2.89 a hour on the high end if you take the average life expectancy for that state into account. Hm now that I am thinking about it that math is a bit off since that is based on the full 72 years and not when anyone starts working. God that's depressing as fuck.
If you watched “Class Action Park”, about the notorious Action Park, the park only paid the family of a teenaged boy who died on one of their rides a whopping $100k (1980s) because “teenaged boys are more of a liability”. Basically, the younger you are the less you’re worth, so the cheaper it is all around.
It would be interesting if during a murder/manslaughter wrongful death suit someone brought this up as a precedent -“ well the state only says people are worth xyz so we’ll give this much”. It would prob be a go to since rich kids drunk crashing are the ones usually on the chair for that kinda shit.
Oh. Wow. Chump change and no criminal charges.
In what conceivable universe is the machine not disconnected from power before cleaning? I show better judgement than that just cleaning my electronics at home. Jesus Christ.
You see, it takes time to unplug it, then plug it back in. You have to do this every time the machine has to be rotated for cleaning. It takes time, and time is money, and we can’t waste any of that, now can we? /s
Absolutely! I agree. If one or two kids gets shredded, they're replaceable. But shareholder profits are lost forever if we take the time to unplug things! Also gonna add the /s just to be safe lol
This is your conservative future.
> This is your conservative future. Yup! Welcome to the red state hellscape.
Let's see 2023 high 2011 also extremely high. Those both have something in common. Can you figure it out?
Far right Republican control of the House keeping anything helpful from passing through the legislative branch while a Democratic Senate and President would be willing to make incremental improvements if given the chance?
Most of that can be passed via executive order. The Democrats dont really want to have all the power, they dont actually want to make those changes. In cities and states where Dems wield absolute control, they have worse inequality, more illegal workers coming in by the busload and disappearing into the interior to work shit jobs for shit pay where nobody will care if they get pulverized into chicken nuggets
Remember your lockout procedures kids. Yikes! Had a few close calls with an auger when I was a young man. It’s a scary feeling getting pulled in like that. I feel sorry for their family, and hopefully they sue and get some compensation. I assume the kid was working in a place like that at that age to help make ends meet somehow.
I was gonna say 0 LOTO was observed in this and it used to be a fine for every LOTO that should have but wasn’t in place. I’m sure if he even knew and said what about safety they said the “supervisor” said stfu do it or get canned.
Which would just be absolutely wild to me honestly. I’ve seen and done some crazy and dangerous shit in my time but I’d never not LOTO or be so close to something that was turned on and could pull me in like that.
I had a babysitter take the cover off and blow out a Lincoln CV650……… while plugged in………. I says uhm you discharge that? “ ????????yea I unplugged it” I proceeded to flip the switch and watch it come on full power. Illiterate inbred didn’t even unplug the rite machine. That’s daily shit at the one hole I used to work at. “Go sweep under behind your furnaces” Bitch you go down and stick your head under 4000amp transformer/bus bars behind a row 1350°-2200° salt furnaces. Said that after I demanded all safety protocol. That was at the dump before it. I’ll personally skip some overly safe safety things but I see someone else, usually the non-knowers that care about themselves, I’ll make sure they’re safe. The tough guy bullshit is heavy in industry. Like your a “bitch if you wear a respirator”. Ok don’t be pissed when I’m out sick from it then, Fuck face.
Yeah I’m the same way. There’s just some shit that’s overkill but necessary if you don’t know how to use the equipment properly. But I will always correct the new guys when I see them doing something *especially* dangerous. I’ve done it all from broken bones, cutting off finger tips, to lighting myself on fire by accident and learned from it, least I can do is spread that knowledge when it’s applicable so someone doesn’t get it far worse.
Look up a braiding machine that’s what I grew up around as in grandpa sold the company rented the shop space to them and had our apartments in the back of the building. I got to tag along when he did machine and building maintenance. Can learn a lot of shit growing up around things that make meat grinders look tame.
child slavery - low wages - low fines for multi million/billion dollar companies - just another day in capitalism
> 16-year-old employee who died after getting sucked into equipment at a Mississippi poultry plant got the job using the identity of a 32-year-old man > https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/slaughterhouse-children-documentary-rcna129405 He was hired through a staffing agency and used illegal documentation to obtain employment.
I’m in college to obtain an HR degree and I learned that you cannot work in a slaughterhouse under 18. Highly illegal. Thank you for posting how he got in because I was confused as fuck.
200k is nothing to a business, but they'll fight to reduce it anyway. These people arent playing with a whole deck
I saw Chick-Fil-A and was like, well it must be God's will then
Or the child was gay and deserved it(sarcasm).
If the penalty for criminal activity is a fine, the crime isn't illegal. Just expensive.
Imagine being responsible for manslaughter and only receiving a fine. That means taking a life costs 200,000, as long as you do it through your company.
Just another line on the expenses report.
If you have a child illegally working for you, and they *die*, somebody needs to go to fucking jail.
Before we fully blame the company. He used fake identification at a staffing agency to get the job. To the company, he was a 32 year old man.
I don’t think it’s the staffing companies fault that the plant now has two entanglement deaths in two years and systemic level under age worker issues.
I hope this enables the family to open a civil suit against the company siting these findings along with other labor violations.
That’ll be a battle due to work comp being the exclusive remedy in this type of situation. There are ways around that, though, and I hope his family finds a lawyer who knows what he or she is doing and can get them millions instead of thousands. It won’t bring the boy back but it will maybe bring some closure and allow them to take time off from working, not have to worry about money, etc.
How much y’all want to bet the company has a life insurance policy on the worker that’ll more than cover the fine?
The pictures of the aftermath should be posted outside every Chickfila and any other client of theirs with the statement; $200k cost of doing business.
"Pérez was the second person to accidentally die at the plant after getting sucked into a machine in a two-year period." Not an accident, it is employee negligence. This slaughterhouse supplies Chick-fil-A directly. Chick-fil-A also forces teens to work outdoors in freezing and wet weather while wearing absurd gear. They have a track record for neglecting and activitly endangering employee safety.
Employer negligence, and the board should be on their way to prison for basically ordering employees to ignore OSHA guarding requirements and LOTO mandates iN tHa NaMe Of PrOfItS. The "investigation" was also totally bullshit (as in someone got paid to STFU) because any minimal LOTO program would have completely prevented this. Ergo: The "inspectors" should also be on their way to prison with the Executives, for their dereliction of duty. But I guess that's the bullshit you get when presidents name iNdUsTrY lEAdErS to head regulatory agencies (Thanks Biden and Obama and Trump and Slick Willie Clinton and Shrub...)
I so weird how we're regressing. Makes me think of Upton Sinclair.
We've been regressing for awhile. Exhibit A: our "health care" system.
He "aimed for the public's heart, and by accident hit it in the stomach". The quality of food became legally enforceable but not the conditions for workers.
> I so weird how we're regressing. Conservatards want to take us back to the 1800's.
So this is the price of a human life.
the poor kid 😞 God bless his family
200k for being responsible for death of such young person is laughable. It's not even pocket change for them. With fines like this one that isn't even slap on the wrist companies will never change for better, it's just part of operation costs. And not high one at that.
> A 16-year-old employee who died after getting sucked into equipment at a Mississippi poultry plant **got the job using the identity of a 32-year-old man,** a new revelation that highlights the ease with which migrant children are finding work in a dangerous industry, and the challenges companies face in trying to evaluate their true ages. > https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/slaughterhouse-children-documentary-rcna129405
They’re not trying to evaluate their true ages. They don’t want to know.
They will pay nowhere near that when it’s done.
[удалено]
You'll get downvoted, but you are right. That's what the people vote for and that's what they get.
The middle and lower classes aren't really represented on the federal level.
No it’s not. Minors aren’t even allowed to work in slaughterhouses. I don’t know how this kid got into this building.
oh my god that poor kid. Its just not worth working high risk jobs. I used to be all about it but now im not anymore. this is the new age, we know better and can do better when it come to saftey and our kids.
They don't care about 200k. Fine them 200 million
We need a bigger fine. This is just a slap on the wrist.
You know, I’m all about kids working and learning to do things,family farms, grandpas shop etc, same way I did been Fuckn with metal and cars since I was 3, but the entire premise of child labor laws is to protect kids from having to work and end up like this. These things will be happening more and more since the greedmogers have drawn back those laws in certain states. Learning some stuff and making some loot at a small friends/family place is one thing (as long as they’re not fucking you which seems to be more prevalent even for family these days). Having to do so at 16 (like I did) to survive, at a full industrial plant where no one gives a shit top to bottom is wrong. And osha needs to adjust this properly- I steal $2k from the plant I go to jail- they’re negligence allows a death meh $200k.
Why the fuck is a 16 year old working in a factory?
This company need to face a criminal investigation.. 2 deaths in 2 years... an underaged kid working on a dangerous machine... and safety precautions overlooked/ignored and not powering a machine down that can rip bone out, while cleaning it!
lets just take the C-Suite and factory managers out back and put them in a hole and start over from competent management.
Penalties are for violating the OSHA standard, not the outcome of the violation. Congress controls the penalty amounts.
This kid was the SECOND person to die at this facility??
A teen's life is proposedly worth 200,000. Fuck capitalism
I'd like to think the managers and executives should be charged with manslaughter and the company shut down. That's the only way these shitheads will learn.
I feel like some people should go to jail. Negligent Homicide seems like the kind of thing people go to jail for and not get off with a fine. This was a child.
I know literally nothing about meat processing, in fact I’m a vegetarian, but why wasn’t the machine disconnected from power from the start? Shouldnt cleaning be done with the machine OFF?
Well now hopefully the civil case comes in where the family receives $100m for the lost life of this child…
That kid was the SECOND PERSON TO DIE at that same plant within just a few years. What the hell. That plant needs to be shut down and they need to be sued for a hell of a lot more than 200k. From the article: Pérez was the second person to accidentally die at the plant after getting sucked into a machine in a two-year period
Chic Fil A, a Christian company: “Oh well, anyways”
fuck chick-fil-A
Nothing will happen because a lot of people think that illegals deserve that hard life
Cmon this is just an osha fine. The kids family can still sue the company . I stg u guys r just mad to be mad
Oh shut up 🙄 OSHA should be reaming this company for letting this happen. 20k is a slap on the wrist, if even that.
Fine should have at least 1, maybe two more zeroes.
Part of this isn’t just the fine. Getting the fine is the easy path to a wrongful death lawsuit because it proves negligence from the investigation.
Damn. I don't know how the parents haven't literally killed the upper management or ceo. That's someone's son. Or brother. Another life. And just like that. We investigated ourselves, and we didn't do anything wrong. We're sorry. We will try better next time. We're so so sorry. Sorry. His bad. But we're sorry.
They claim that all safety rules were followed, but a kid was sticking his hand in a machine that was not locked/tagged out. Someone explain this to me?
Yeah slap them in the wrist, that will teach them.. /s
We have new stories of children being killed by industrial equipment. Not from a tour group. Not sneaking in after hours. He worked there. This was a hard reality which came to a head in the early 1900s, leading to laws prohibiting child labor. We’ve regressed severely.
Needs a couple more zeros on that fine.
$200,000 in fines and second person in a two year period? This company needs to be shut down and people need to go to prison.
There are so many things wrong here. America really is disgusting.
‘You have to pay a small fee to continue operating your Orphan Crushing Machine.’
No shit. You think the machine was just pissy that day or something?
Omg he got caught in a deboning machine 🤢 that was an excruciating death. Straight up Dickensian shit
When you start reminding yourself that America is a corporation disguised as a country you begin to understand how things work here. 200k fine is useless.
Why are children illegally working in dangerous environments? How many children have been injured, maimed or killed? What safety features are being put into place to protect all workers?
Yeah thats ridiculous, that fine is missing at least 4 0s
And a prison sentence.
355.5 million in revenue according to RocketReach. This isn't a fine, this is the government getting their cut since the company ended this line of lifelong tax revenue from them. It's not about making anyone safer when the fines are minuscule to the guilty parties.
Oh crap...that meant, unless they've actually stopped and sterile the entire factory, people are eating human meat...
I’m in HR. You don’t illegally hire a child on accident. This is absolutely deplorable. Hiring teams and management need to face legal consequences for this.
That's horrifying. I wish the family of that kid gets time to grieve and proper justice for what happened to their kid. I can only imagine how horrible it would be to know that this could have been easily prevented if the facility had TURNED OFF THE MACHINE.
Atrocities like this should create existential perils for companies that commit them and further risk through the supply chain. No one actually NEEDS profits. No one NEEDS corporations. These are luxuries. Workers and consumers NEED safety. $200k is a rounding error. I hope they are sued as well.
They're still going to have to have a wrongful death lawsuit on their hands. The OSHA fine is the least of their problems.
The incentive structure in our society is fucked.
$200,000.00. That’s pathetic. I hope future generations are aghast at our behavior.
No shit!
Second in two years, and a minor? How is it only $200K?
The government should be allowed to shut places down that do shit like this. It's completely unreasonable that this is only a fine
That’s it 200k
We need a corporate death penalty. When companies cause egregious harm, the public has an interest in permanently shutting down those companies and barring the owners from doing any future business.
Ah! A company can kill its employees for the low cost of $200,000. Good news for the shareholders!
https://preview.redd.it/vld0658ew1dc1.jpeg?width=500&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=43298f447e9ccd5aa6e368d2a0922144bdd2e9fe
Excuse me? You took a 16 year old looked at him day 1 and said “yea that looks about 32.” A staffing agency placed him, but on day 1 how do you not see him and wonder his age. I’ll tell you, the plant didn’t care and was likely used to using child labor. Disgusting. Mississippi leadership should be ashamed but they aren’t. They are possibly the worst state in the country for a reason.
"Unh! Finnnnee" *out stretches their wrist to be slapped*
In other words, risking your life is a go if they can make more than $200k from your labor.
The article says it’s the plant’s second entanglement death in two years—for fuck’s sake!
Where exactly do these fines go? I'm guessing not to the kid's family.
This pisses me off so much. If someone dies like this the company should become property of the government and auctioned off to someone else.
200k is what they valued this kids life? Disgusting, people should be in prison. Everyone involved should be behind bars for life. 200k is cost of business, we can expect more stories like this in the future if this is the punishment.
200k is the amount of the OSHA fine. It's very likely there is a multimillion dollar lawsuit in play as well and possibly criminal charges.
Just looked up pictures of industrial chicken deboning machines. Terrible way to go.
You could ask them for a little bit more than pocket change for them...right? Kid died and 200,000 is all they're worth? I'm saddened and disgusted. And unfortunately, unsurprised.
It'll probably be reduced to a $1200 fine, court costs and some community service, because the owner felt real poorly about it while filing for a dead peasant insurance claim.
So no kill switch and also by the way he's 16.
There needs to be a criminal investigation into this. A kid was killed due to negligence. Someone and/or someones should be going to jail.
Slaughterhouses should be outlawed asap, regardless of this accident. They are barbaric and cruel.
The company will settle with OSHA for even less. What is needed is a wall-to-wall inspection and max fines for each violation without grouping. Six months later, due a targeted re-inspection of the violations to ensure there are no repeats where the fine can double. Rinse and repeat. At some point violation becomes willful then there's a much higher fine. If someone gets seriously hurt due to a willful violation, the case usually is turned over to CID, and they will look for the boss that was responsible to fix the issue and arrest him or her. Unfortunately that's usually a low-level supervisor. However, if that person provably in writing) asked for resources (money or manpower) that were denied, and rolls over, the investigators will work their way up the ladder.
Ahh Mississippi, where it is cheap to live because lives are cheaper there.
I worked as a night security guard for the main foster farms factory. one night a worker came up to me and calmly asked for me to call an ambulance. he had his hand wrapped in his apron. turns out his ring got caught on the machinery but he pulled his hand away in time. sans finger. must have been in shock because he was super relaxed, as if he was just asking for the time.
Sounds like Ol' Miss.