Georgia Workers Compensation Attorney Blog

Publix grocery store, with 182 locations in Georgia alone, has been fined almost $200,000 for alleged work safety hazards in Georgia and Florida.

Most recently, an employee lost a hand after alleged negligence at one of the locations.

Our Atlanta workers compensation attorneys understand that due to a host of violations at various stores across the country (including in Georgia), the grocery chain has been placed on the Severe Violator Enforcement Program with the U.S. Department of Occupational Safety and Health Administration. That's according to the Financial News & Daily Record.

Media reports indicate that this latest incident happened at a distribution center in Jacksonville on West Beaver Street. The employee had been cleaning equipment when his hand was sliced off.

OSHA has said that the incident would not have occurred had Publix taken certain precautions. Publix officials disagree, and say they plan to fight the government agency's decision.

While it is true that some accidents may not be foreseeable or preventable, oftentimes a company is aware of certain safety risks, yet chooses not to address them because to do so would require time and money they do not wish to spend.

In this case, the complaint was first made in September.

OSHA's Jacksonville-area director, Brian Sturtecky, said that Public officials knew about the risks to which its cleaning crew was being exposed. And yet, it didn't take any action to keep its employees safe from harm, which could have been as simple as implementing controls on the conveyor equipment's source of energy.

Sturtecky said opening up the possibility of having a limb amputated is absolutely unacceptable, and further, that action has to be taken immediately.

OSHA said one of the grocery chain's violations was "willful," which essentially means that the company broke the rules knowingly, and with a total disregard for the law. That is going to cost them a penalty of about $70,000.

Additionally, the store had two repeat violations. Those could result in a fine of about $66,000. Those include a failure to use or even have a procedure for lockout-/tagout and the failure to conduct a yearly inspection of the energy control procedures. The store was cited for the exact same offense in Georgia four years ago.

Another six violations are considered serious, and could result in fines of nearly $40,000 for not properly training employees on a number of safety issues. Another six violations, which include things like improper documentation and paperwork, could bring a fine of nearly $7,000.

The store has half a month from the time it received these notices to comply with the federal agency's request to either pay the fines or fight back on the allegations.
A company spokesman told the Daily Record that the store does maintain a safe working environment, and it plans to appeal the findings. He added, however, that the store intends to address any issues that could have been a contributing factor in the instance where an employee lost his hand, which he called "an unfortunate incident."