8/27/07

As my brother, Gary Puleio, was killed at Meadville Redi-Mix Concrete on 8/15/2001, I am painfully familiar with Kebert Construction’s history of previous violations.
He had been employed there as a cement truck driver and fell 25 feet to his death, from a cement tower, while shoveling gravel off the hopper to clean it. OSHA accepted Redi-Mix’s claim that Gary just “wandered up there on his own” rather than being assigned this task, and after admitting no wrong doing, the company paid a $6000 fine for REPEAT violations for not posting danger signs at a confined space and not implementing measures to prevent unauthorized entry. This company had multiple serious violations issued only months before Gary was killed which were informally settled with reduced fines.
OSHA has recently found 3 serious violations in its investigation of July’s “runaway wrecking ball” incident at Allegheny College and is proposing total fines of $7500 for Kebert Construction. While OSHA regulations propose a mandatory penalty of up to $7000 for each serious violation, the penalties may be adjusted downward “based on the employer’s good faith, history of previous violations, the gravity of the alleged violation, and the size of the business”. OSHA is proposing a penalty for each violation listed on the citation of $2500 making the total penalty $7500. Now that the citation is issued, the employer can request an informal meeting to discuss the case and enter into settlement agreements.
Corporations routinely “negotiate” with OSHA to downgrade fines through a process called “abatement” Aggrieved families of dead workers have no such access to OSHA.
In the past 20 years, 170,000 workplace fatalities occurred but only about 1700 were considered by OSHA to be due to the “willful” violation of safety laws. Without a “willful” designation it is difficult for prosecutors to make a case that an employer was criminally liable and civil suits pursued by families are not likely to succeed. The percentage of cases being downgraded from “willful” to less serious violations has been rising steadily. In 2001, the year my brother was killed, 60 percent of all cases were downgraded. Of the mere 1700 “willful’ cases out of 170,000 fatalities in the past 20 years, only 196 were referred to prosecutors. In these 20 years there were only 81 convictions and only 16 carried jail sentences.
It is a MISDEMEANOR to kill a worker by willfully violating safety laws. The maximum sentence is 6 months in jail.
OSHA fines are not issued as punishment and no amount of money can ever compensate for the loss of life. However the issuance of trivial fines and citations results in no accountability nor any acknowledgement of responsibility on the part of the offending company.

Donna Puleio Spadaro, MD

more information on Gary Puleio http://garypuleio.blogspot.com