Mississippi poultry plant reaches settlement with OSHA after teen's death in 2023

A Mississippi poultry processing plant will pay $164,814 in fines and implement additional safety measures under a settlement with the US Department of Labor reached after a 16-year-old boy died at the facility.

Friday's announcement was part of a news release following up on an investigation by the department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration in the case of an underaged worker who died after he was pulled into a machine as he was cleaning it on July 14, 2023, at Mar-Jac Poultry.

"Tragically, a teenage boy died needlessly before Mar-Jac Poultry took the required steps to protect its workers," said OSHA Regional Administrator Kurt Petermeyer in Atlanta. "This settlement demands the company commit to a safer workplace environment and take tangible actions to protect their employees from well-known hazards. Enhanced supervision and increased training can go a long way toward minimising risks faced by workers in meat processing facilities."

"Mar-Jac was aware of these safety problems for years and had been warned and fined by OSHA, yet did nothing. Hopefully, Mar-Jac will follow through this time so that no other worker is killed in such a senseless manner," Jim Reeves, an attorney for the victim's family, told WHLT-TV.

The victim's family sued Mar-Jac Poultry MS, LLC, and Onin Staffing this year. The suit claimed Perez was killed because Mar-Jac chose to ignore safety regulations by choosing not to shut off machinery during sanitation. Onin Staffing was negligent as well, they say, for the illegal assignment of the 16-year-old at the plant.

Based in Gainesville, Georgia, Mar-Jac Poultry has raised live birds for poultry production since 1954 at facilities in Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi for food service customers in the US and abroad, the DOL's news release said.

A telephone call to the company seeking comment about the settlement was unanswered on Friday.