Food sanitation company accused of employing at least 31 children on graveyard shifts in slaughterhouses
Ministry of Labor announced.
Packers Sanitation Services, Inc., or PSSI, a company contracted to work at slaughterhouses and meatpacking facilities across the county, allegedly employed at least 31 children — one 13-year-old — on shifts. overnight cleaning at three facilities in Nebraska and Minnesota, according to court documents filed Wednesday.
Those practices would violate the Fair Labor Standards Act, which prohibits “oppressive child labor” and minors from working in any type of hazardous work, according to the complaint. Regulations on Child Labor of the Ministry of Labor point Many roles in abattoirs and meat packing facilities are dangerous for minors.
In a court filing, U.S. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh asked the Nebraska County Federal Court to issue a temporary injunction and preliminary nationwide injunction against the company preventing the employment of minors. while the Department of Labor continues to investigate.
Early evidence suggests the company may also be recruiting more children under similar conditions at 400 other locations across the country, in addition to the 31 minors employed at the three sites that investigators found. confirmed, according to the complaint.
The court partially accepted the Labor Department’s request in a filing filed on Thursday. That order requires PSSI to “immediately cease and desist from using oppressed child labor” and comply with a Department of Labor investigation.
A hearing is set for November 23 to discuss whether the order will be extended, modified or dissolved.
In a statement to NBC News, a spokesperson for PSSI said it “has an absolute company-wide ban on hiring anyone under the age of 18 and has zero tolerance for any major violations of the law.” which book – period.”
The spokesperson added that the company mandates the use of the federal E-Verify system for new employees, “as well as intensive training, document verification, biometrics, and multiple audit classes.”
“While rogue individuals may of course seek to engage in fraud or identity theft, we believe in our company’s strict compliance policies and will protect our privacy. strongly against these claims.”
The spokesperson added that executives were “surprised” by the DOL filing because the company “cooperatively cooperated with their investigation, produced the documents, and responded widely.”
The Department of Labor did not immediately respond to the PSSI’s investigation into compliance and cooperation claims.
The company, which has been owned by a series of private equity funds since 2007, says it employs 17,000 people at more than 700 locations nationwide. according to its website.
Late night, early morning and chemical burns
The complaint says the Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division began investigating PSSI on August 24, when it received a tip from law enforcement that the company may be recruiting children. .
Officials executed search warrants at two plants owned by food processing company JBS USA — in Grand Island, Nebraska and Worthington, Minnesota — and at a Turkey Valley Farms poultry processing plant in Marshall, Minnesota. Searches were also conducted at PSSI’s local offices in Grand Island and Worthington, where workers were employed, and the company’s Keiler, Wisconsin, corporate office.
In a statement, JBS US Ethics and Compliance Director, Michael Koenig, said the allegations against PSSI “represent a clear violation of our ethics policies” if true.
“We are immediately conducting an independent, third-party audit of all of our facilities to thoroughly assess the situation,” the statement continued. “JBS has zero tolerance for child labor, discrimination or unsafe working conditions for anyone working in our facilities.”
Turkey Valley Farms’ general manager, Les Goff, said in a statement that the company “takes these allegations very seriously” and is looking into the matter internally.
“We expect all contractors to share our commitment to the health and safety of any individual working in our facilities and to adhere to these principles to promote safe work environment and in compliance with all applicable federal and state employment laws,” the statement continued.
“We are closely monitoring the actions of the Department of Labor regarding Packers Sanitation Services Inc. and will take any appropriate action, based on the results of the investigation.”
Labor department officials also requested school records, interviewed confidential sources – including minors working in the facilities – and conducted surveillance in which they allegedly looked found minors entering the facility to work the night shift as part of the investigation, the complaint states.
The investigation found that minors mopped floors and killed people and various machines — including meat and bone saws and grinders — during shifts at the cemetery, according to the lawsuit.
PSSI employed at least a dozen 17-year-olds at three abattoirs, 14 16-year-olds, three 15-year-olds, one 14-year-old and one 13-year-old, the complaint said.
Interviews with the children – conducted in Spanish, their native language, according to the complaint – revealed that some children started shifts at the facilities at 11 p.m. and work until 5, 6 or 7 am. Some work up to six or seven days a week.
School records show that a 14-year-old student, who worked at the Grand Island facility from 11 p.m. to 5 a.m., five to six days a week, from December 2021 to this past April, fell asleep during the school day. class and missed school after a chemical burn injury. At least two other minors also suffered chemical burns, the complaint states.
‘The kids…can’t wait’
The complaint states that during the investigation, PSSI managers “attempted to obstruct or obfuscate” the collection of evidence, including by attempting to obstruct the investigator’s interview by way around the room where they are being conducted and keep eye contact with minors.
Managers also attempted to hide or delete material, including work-related text messages and incident/accident reports, the lawsuit states.
Late last month, the Labor Department began looking into 47 other locations where PSSI employs workers — which investigators suspect have more children, the complaint alleges, pointing to photos from the filing. stored at eight other factories with children’s images.
“Although Wage and Hour is continuing to pour files to identify such children, it is slow and labor-intensive work. The children, however, work overnight on the slaughter floor of these children. This slaughterhouse cannot wait,” the complaint states.
Previous issues of occupational safety
Incidents of injuries and even deaths employed by PSSI are not new.
The company had a Difficult worker safety records in recent years: three PSSI workers have died on the job since 2018, including one who was beheaded while cleaning a chicken chiller, according to Occupational Safety and Health Administration records specified in a March report by the watchdog group Private equity stakeholder project.
And four others had accidents that resulted in amputations, according to the report.
Blackstone, the private equity fund that owns PSSI, intense disagree with the report’s findings.
Blackstone spokesman Matthew Anderson said in a statement: “The so-called ‘report’ – laden with errors and misinformation – is by a group of shells against private equity, bias, and bias. “. Regarding the total of four PSSI deaths that have been recorded by OSHA since 2018, Blackstone added: “In those cases: one was clearly identified as a non-work-related death ; in the second OSHA did not issue a penalty against PSSI or otherwise our company’s fault; and in two other matters, existing PSSI safety protocols were not followed.”
Last year, OSHA cited PSSI for 17 violations for failing to train workers on the dangers of liquid nitrogen after Nitrogen leak kills six people who worked for the Foundation Food Group at a poultry plant in Gainesville, Georgia. OSHA said those killed were not PSSI employees, but PSSI was responsible for cleaning the plant and making sure its workers were safe there.
A PSSI spokesperson said company employees were not on site at the time of the leak and were not involved in the manufacturing process or mechanical maintenance of the equipment.
One Analysis of 2017 by the National Employment Law Project, an advocacy group, found that PSSI has some of the worst workplace injury rates in the country.
PSSI describes the report as flawed.
When employed by PSSI, the worker signs paperwork assuming there is a risk of death and injury on the job, NBC News reported last year. Many of its employees have criminal records on file and have difficulty finding work elsewhere – something advocates such as the Private Equity Project say discourage workers from reporting hazardous conditions. for fear that they might lose their jobs.
According to a Labor Department report obtained by NBC News via FOIA last year, OSHA opened inspections of PSSI 56 times over a five-year period, from 2015 to 2020, and issued 38 citations against company.
