Federal Agency Decisions
Federal workers' compensation appeals from the Department of Labor's Employees' Compensation Appeals Board (ECAB), federal-sector labor-relations cases from the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), mine-safety cases from the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission (FMSHRC), workplace-safety cases from the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC), Longshore Act and Black Lung Benefits Act appeals from the Department of Labor's Benefits Review Board (BRB), precedent decisions of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), environmental permit and penalty appeals from the EPA's Environmental Appeals Board (EAB), and whistleblower and other labor appeals from the Department of Labor's Administrative Review Board (ARB), each with a plain-English summary, the law it cites, and whether it counts as precedent. More agencies are coming.
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Matter of Wong
Remand children's visa petitions for proof of parentage
A lawful permanent resident appealed the denial of visa petitions for two children born in China before he married their mother. The District Director found that the children were not legitimated before age 18. The Board held that Article 15 of the People's Republic of China's Marriage Law made…
Matter of Serna
Seek more proof of petitioner's U.S. birthplace
A woman sought immediate relative status for her spouse, claiming U.S. citizenship by birth in Texas. The District Director denied the petition because he found her delayed birth certificate and baptismal record insufficient to establish citizenship. The Board clarified that a delayed birth…
Burkart-Randall Company
Ambiguous machine-guarding settlement remanded
Burkart-Randall and the Secretary settled numerous citation items for $9,000, with detailed safeguards and abatement terms for mechanical power presses. After approval, the parties jointly reported that four citation No. 2 items had mistakenly been classified as serious rather than repeated. The…
Matter of Muller
Former resident excluded after long stay abroad and military desertion
A Mexican citizen who had been admitted as a permanent resident left the U.S. Army without leave and later lived in Mexico with his wife and children from 1968 to 1974. He sought admission as a returning resident after hearing of President Ford's clemency program. The Board held that his prolonged…
Kaiser Aluminum & Chemical Corporation
Crane-brake settlement rejected
OSHA cited Kaiser because ten cranes handling molten metal had one holding brake rather than the two required by the standard. The Secretary and Kaiser settled by treating the condition as de minimis, eliminating the penalty and abatement requirement, and withdrawing the company's contest. The…
Bethlehem Steel Corporation (Buffalo Tank Div.)
ALJ decision affirmed without review
The Commission directed review of the Bethlehem Steel case on its own initiative. Neither party petitioned for review, objected to the Administrative Law Judge's decision, or otherwise expressed dissatisfaction. The Commission found no compelling public interest requiring it to decide the case's…
Western Waterproofing Co., Inc.
Losing the midrail finding on appeal barely lowers gravity, because the fall hazard came from untied safety belts rather than from railings
This is a penalty reassessment on remand from the Eighth Circuit, and it is a short document about how much a partial appellate loss is actually worth. How the case got here. The Commission had found that Western Waterproofing willfully failed to comply with three scaffolding standards, 29…
Western Waterproofing Co., Inc.
Willful scaffold penalty set at $8,000 after court remand
Western Waterproofing employees worked on noncomplying suspension scaffolds 17 to 47 feet above the ground. An appeals court upheld willful violations involving missing safety-belt lifelines, failure to lash the scaffolds to the building, and missing toeboards, but rejected the Commission’s earlier…
Champion Construction Engineering Co.
ALJ decision conditionally affirmed
The judge affirmed several OSHA violations, and Champion Construction initially sought Commission review. The company later reported that it would assign its assets for creditors, cease operating, and withdraw its request to file a brief. The Commission found that letter ambiguous as to whether…
Southwestern Bell Telephone Co.
Rungs on 12-inch centers means the top rung too, and once the parties consent the judge has no discretion to refuse the amendment
Southwestern Bell employees were splicing cable inside a manhole. The metal ladder attached to the neck of the manhole started low: the first rung sat about 36 inches below ground level and 4 feet 1 inch below the top of the collar. Every rung below the top one was 12 inches from the next. The…
Deering Milliken, Inc.
The cotton dust limit is a total dust limit, and a mill that cannot separate cotton from dirt in the sample has no defense in that fact
OSHA inspected Deering Milliken's Unity Plant in La Grange, Georgia, and found cotton dust above the 1 mg/m3 limit in the opening rooms and the waste house. The company was charged with failing to implement feasible engineering controls under 29 C.F.R. § 1910.1000(e), and with failing to provide…
Matter of Carrillo
Firearm conviction does not establish narcotics deportability
A Mexican citizen and lawful permanent resident was convicted of carrying a firearm during a felony involving heroin possession. An immigration judge found him deportable under a statute covering convictions under laws relating to illicit narcotics possession. The Board held that the firearm law…
Secretary of Labor v. Republic Steel Corporation
Republic Steel Corporation (FMSHRC PITT 78-156-P): Settlement approvals remanded for explanation
A judge approved proposed settlements in eight civil penalty proceedings involving Republic Steel Corporation. The Commission directed review because the decisions may have been contrary to law or Commission policy and presented a new policy question. The released order asks what reasons and facts…
Western Electric Co., Inc.
A settlement approved in two sentences draws a dissent arguing that abatement must be proved on the record, not asserted in the agreement
This is a two-sentence order. The Commission approved the parties' settlement agreement of July 12, 1978, citing Aspro, Inc., Spun Steel Division and Dawson Brothers Mechanical Contractors . Commissioner Cottine dissented at length, and the dissent is the substance of the document. Western Electric…
Matter of Chumpitazi
Conditional asylum grant vacated
A Peruvian citizen had remained in the United States beyond his authorized visitor stay. An immigration judge conditionally granted him asylum if deportation to Peru became imminent. The Board held that, under the regulations then in force, the immigration judge lacked authority to grant asylum; it…
John & Roy Carlstrom d/b/a Carlstrom Brothers Construction
A judge may try a standard nobody pleaded when the objection runs to the legal theory rather than to the evidence
Carlstrom was a subcontractor on a building site in Fremont, Nebraska. It rigged a single-point suspension scaffold hung from two ten-foot I-beams welded and bolted into a twenty-foot outrigger laid on the roof. The counterweight at the back end was two five-gallon paint drums filled with concrete…
IMC Chemical Group, Inc.
Union allowed to oppose citation withdrawal
After IMC contested two citations, the Secretary moved to withdraw the first serious citation before filing a complaint because the alleged hazard had not occurred as charged. The employee union timely asked the Commission to keep the citation in place, but the judge ruled that the Secretary could…
Matter of Garcia
Birth certificates did not establish a prior marriage
A U.S. citizen petitioned for immediate relative status for her husband, a Mexican citizen. The District Director denied the petition because he believed she had an earlier undissolved common-law marriage in Texas. His evidence was the birth certificates of her five children, which identified…
CF&I Steel Corporation
An inspection conducted without presenting credentials gives the employer no remedy absent a Fourth Amendment violation or actual prejudice
This is the tail end of a case the employer had already won once and then lost on appeal. What remained was a single unanswered question, and the answer followed from what the court of appeals had already found. An explosion in one of CF&I's furnaces at its Pueblo, Colorado works killed…
CF&I Steel Corporation
Furnace-hazard citation and $300 penalty affirmed
OSHA cited CF&I Steel under the general duty clause for exposing its employees to flame, extreme heat, and molten metal during furnace-charging operations at its Pueblo, Colorado, facility. The inspection followed an explosion that killed two employees of an independent contractor working in the…
Brockway Glass Company, Inc.
Noise-abatement extension conditionally affirmed
Brockway Glass sought an extension to December 31, 1979 for final abatement of an occupational-noise violation, and the parties settled on that date. The judge approved the agreement before the employee representatives received copies. The Commission held that sending the executed agreement after…
Continental Can Company, U.S.A., a member of The Continental Group, Inc.
Noise cases dismissed under court order
Multiple Continental Can cases alleged excessive noise at company facilities across the country. Continental argued that an earlier Commission ruling barred the Secretary from relitigating the economic feasibility of noise controls at other plants, but the Commission had previously rejected that…
McLean-Behm Steel Erectors, Inc.
An employer that defends by naming a more specific standard impliedly consents to be tried under it
A welder and his helper were installing window framing on the fourth or fifth floor of a hotel going up in Atlanta. They worked from "monkey bars," a steel truss with top and bottom chords two and a half feet apart, joined by vertical and diagonal bracing every four feet six inches. The cement…
Otis Elevator Company
A rope sagging to within eight inches of the floor guards nothing, and exposure turns on access to the hazard rather than proof an employee stood in it
Otis was the elevator subcontractor on a job in Topeka, Kansas, adding two levels to an existing parking garage. On October 30, 1975 its employees were working at the bottom of a double elevator shaft, preparing to install a hydraulic cylinder. A compliance officer inspected and Otis received…
Matter of Carbajal
Repeated voluntary departures did not prove bad moral character
The Commissioner reviewed a Mexican applicant's request for permission to reapply for admission after deportation. The applicant had entered the United States unlawfully four times, but each time he came to the attention of immigration authorities he received voluntary departure, which required a…
Kroehler Manufacturing Co.
Guillotine-cutter penalty reduced to $250
Kroehler used a guillotine cardboard cutter whose two-hand control allowed the operator to release one lever and move a hand near the descending blade during the cutting cycle. The Commission held that no more specific machine-guarding standard applied to the furniture plant, so the general…
Christopher Coal Company
$6,500 penalty affirmed
Christopher Coal Company appealed an Administrative Law Judge decision assessing a $6,500 civil penalty for violating 30 C.F.R. § 75.329 at its Osage No. 3 Mine. The Commission reviewed the record and concluded that the company had not shown a reason to disturb the judge’s findings, legal…
General Motors Corporation
Noise-abatement date corrected to March 1979
General Motors requested an extension of the deadline for abating an excessive-noise violation, and the settlement set March 14, 1979 as the new date. The judge's approval order mistakenly used March 14, 1978, and the judge lacked jurisdiction to correct the filed order himself. The agreement had…
Matter of Chheav
Spouse of a refugee may seek adjustment without an approved visa petition
A Mexican citizen sought to reopen her deportation proceedings to apply for adjustment of status based on her marriage to a claimed Cambodian refugee. The trial attorney opposed reopening because no visa petition had been filed and approved for her. The Board held that an approved visa petition was…
Grossman Steel & Aluminum Corp.
Multiple construction-site charges vacated
Grossman Steel was an iron subcontractor at a Veterans Administration hospital project and faced fire-protection, cylinder-storage, extinguisher, and falling-material allegations. The Commission vacated the general duty clause charge because Grossman's employees neither used nor had reason to use…
Safeway Stores, Inc.
Late contest remanded over missing citation
The judge dismissed Safeway's notice of contest as untimely, making two citations and their penalties final. Safeway told the Commission that it had received only one citation page and had never received the separate second citation. It also offered reasons for missing the contest deadline and…
Yelvington Welding Service
A failure to report a fatality continues until the Secretary learns of it, and it tolls the six-month limit on citing the hazard that caused the death
An employee died on January 9, 1975 while making welding repairs underneath a suspended trailer-mounted fertilizer hopper that was not secured or blocked. Yelvington did not report the death. The Secretary learned of it on October 10, 1975, when the State of Florida told him. He inspected about two…
MRS Printing, Incorporated
Easily bypassed cutter control violated guarding rule
MRS Printing operated a guillotine paper cutter with two controls, but an employee could activate one control with a knee and leave a hand free near the blade. The Commission held that the point-of-operation guard failed because the standard requires a device designed to prevent any body part from…
Matter of Handley
United States adoption did not qualify an in-country orphan
The Regional Commissioner reviewed a petition by a United States citizen seeking immediate-relative classification for a child from Peru. The child entered the United States, was paroled for humanitarian reasons, and was later adopted in Colorado. The Commissioner held that the orphan provision…
Matter of Shen
Mother may supply further proof of daughter’s birth
A lawful permanent resident petitioned for an immigrant visa for a woman she said was her daughter, born in Taiwan. The district director denied the petition because the daughter was absent from the mother's earlier visa application and household registration records. The Board said a Taiwanese…
Williams Enterprises
Safety-net violation affirmed for unprotected ironworkers
Two Williams ironworkers connected steel about 49 feet above concrete without safety belts, nets, scaffolds, or temporary floors. Williams argued that installing nets was impossible because of the structure, existing scaffolds, anchorage distances, and net weight. The Commission found that the…
Bailey Construction Company
A defective tool that is merely available for use violates the grounding standard; the Secretary need not prove anyone used it or would have
A compliance officer inspected a small general contractor working inside the laundry building at a New York State correctional facility in Coxsackie, breaking out a hole in the concrete floor to set a scale frame. Two employees were on site, a foreman named Feeley and a laborer named Willingham. A…
Aspro, Inc., Spun Steel Division
Abatement settlement set aside for missing employee notice
Aspro requested an extension of an abatement deadline, and the judge approved a settlement granting the requested date. The petition had not been posted for affected employees, and the union elected party status shortly after approval and objected. The Secretary acknowledged that employee notice…
Wray Electric Contracting, Inc.
A heading cannot narrow the text underneath it, so a body belt rule written into the aerial lift standards reaches an aerial ladder
An electrical contractor was repairing an overhead traffic signal at Mount Healthy, Ohio. The employee doing the work stood on a small platform at the top of an aerial ladder truck, 16 feet 3 inches above the road surface with moving traffic beneath him, wearing neither a body belt nor a lanyard…
Asplundh Tree Expert Company
Supervisors catching a few violations is evidence a safety program is working, not evidence it failed, and a judge must weigh the witnesses he never mentioned
A compliance officer named Strobach watched an Asplundh foreman named Anderson trimming trees from an aerial lift bucket about 25 feet up, near the University of Missouri campus in Rolla. Anderson was not wearing a body belt. Asplundh was cited for one nonserious item with a proposed penalty of…
Matter of Biebl
Foreign divorce did not establish a stepchild relationship
A U.S. citizen petitioned for an immigrant visa for his wife's daughter. The district director denied the petition, and the Board dismissed the appeal. The petitioner's earlier divorce had been granted in the Dominican Republic while he and his first wife were domiciled in New York. Connecticut…
Matter of Bautista
Marriage of second cousins qualifies for a spouse visa petition
A lawful permanent resident petitioned for an immigrant visa for his wife, whom he had married in the Philippines. An immigration officer denied the petition, reasoning that the marriage was prohibited because the spouses were related. The Board found that they were collateral relatives in the…
Matter of Patel
Reopening denied for one respondent, other motion returned
Two respondents sought to reopen deportation proceedings to apply for relief from deportation. The Board denied the male respondent's motion because showing the minimum period of continuous physical presence and making conclusory hardship claims did not establish a basis for reopening. It had…
J. H. MacKay Electric Company and U.S. Engineering Company
A scaffold hanging outside the floor edge is not the equivalent of a guardrail, and a subcontractor who cannot install one must still ask for it and do something else when asking fails
Two subcontractors were building a hospital in Kansas City, Missouri. MacKay did the electrical work, U.S. Engineering the plumbing, heating and air conditioning. On the fifth floor their employees were installing conduit and setting plumbing sleeves on temporary plywood decking, getting ready for…
Matter of Anderson
Economic hardship alone did not justify suspension of deportation
A Dominican Republic citizen appealed the denial of his application to suspend deportation after overstaying a visitor admission. He argued that the Dominican Republic's economy would make it hard to support himself and his wife, and that her medical care would be costly. The Board held that…
Granite-Groves, A Joint Venture
Hazardous material-hoist violation affirmed
Granite-Groves employees used a hazardous material hoist for two days before the company stopped its operation. The company argued that its foreman's knowledge should not be imputed and that shutting down the hoist satisfied its duty. The Commission upheld the judge's rejection of those arguments…
Hamilton Foundry Division
Grinder case remanded to reconstruct missing testimony
OSHA cited Hamilton Foundry over a grinder work rest that allegedly exceeded the one-eighth-inch maximum gap from the wheel. After the hearing transcript omitted portions of a witness's testimony, the judge dismissed the citation rather than reconstructing the record or determining whether the…
Bethlehem Steel Corporation
Hearing moved from Philadelphia to Allentown
Bethlehem Steel's case involved about 36 remaining citation items and more than 20 expected witnesses for each of the company, the Secretary, and the union. Nearly all witnesses worked or lived near Bethlehem and Allentown, while the judge set the hearing in Philadelphia more than 50 miles from the…
Ford, Bacon & Davis Construction Co., Inc.
An inspecting engineer who assumed somebody else was watching the valves violated the general duty clause, and the test is feasibility rather than industry custom
Natural gas exploded at a compressor station owned by Michigan Wisconsin Pipe Line Company. Workers in a ditch were killed and others were injured. The released decision does not say how many, and footnote 4 says so explicitly: the record did not establish the number. The employer cited here did…
Irwin Steel Erectors, Inc.
Omitted settlement penalty corrected to $250
Irwin Steel Erectors and the Secretary settled the case, but their written agreement accidentally omitted the negotiated penalty for citation item 2(a). The judge treated the omission as leaving the original $560 proposal in place. The parties jointly asked the Commission to correct the order…
Walter C. Mehlenbacher
A migrant labor camp and the fields are one workplace, so the farm owner employs the laborers even though a crew chief hires and pays them
Two compliance officers inspected the Mehlenbacher Scholes temporary labor camp on Murphy Road in Pike, New York, on October 15, 1975. About forty migrant farm laborers lived there while harvesting potatoes. The officers found broken windows, torn insect screens, unmarked shared toilet rooms…
Matter of Arthur
Payment for visa papers supports smuggling for gain finding
A Panamanian citizen appealed an order excluding and deporting him after he tried to transport other people into the United States illegally. Passengers gave him about $200 to obtain entry papers in addition to money for gasoline. The Board held that this supported a finding of smuggling for gain…
ITT Thompson Industries, Inc.
Settlement affirmed after employee representative review
The Secretary and ITT Thompson Industries settled serious, repeated, and willful machine-guarding and housekeeping citations, but an administrative error excluded the authorized employee representative from the negotiations and initial review of the agreement. After review was directed, union…
Eaton Corporation
Review petition withdrawn
Eaton Corporation petitioned for Commission review of an Administrative Law Judge's decision in two consolidated dockets. A Commissioner granted review, but Eaton later moved to withdraw its petition. No party objected to the judge's decision. The Commission granted the withdrawal and affirmed the…
Matter of Tong
Unauthorized self-employment barred adjustment of status
A Hong Kong citizen who had entered as a student remained in the United States after his authorized stay ended. He opened a used car dealership without permission and sought adjustment of status based on a petition filed by his permanent resident mother. The Board held that running his own…
Atlantic Sugar Association
A direction for review that no party answers leaves the judge's decision affirmed but carrying only the weight of an unreviewed decision
This is a short order, and what it settles is how a case leaves the Commission. It says nothing about sugar processing, and it names no safety standard. A case reaches the Commission in one of two ways. A party can petition for review, or a Commissioner can direct review on his own motion. This…
Matter of Pereyra
Exchange visitor may seek suspension if residency rule no longer applies
A Philippine citizen who had entered as an exchange visitor applied for suspension of deportation after remaining past her authorized stay. The immigration judge denied the application without considering its merits, treating exchange visitor status as an absolute statutory bar. The Board held that…
Matter of Marin
Serious drug conviction required stronger equities for a waiver
A Colombian lawful permanent resident appealed the denial of a discretionary waiver after a conviction for selling cocaine. The Board explained that a waiver decision balances adverse factors against family, residence, hardship, rehabilitation, and other favorable evidence. A serious drug offense…
Matter of Rahman
Presidential pardon ends deportation case for evading military service
A Pakistani lawful permanent resident was ordered deported because he had left the United States to avoid military service and then returned. After the Supreme Court and the Sixth Circuit sent his case back, the Board considered President Carter's pardon and its implementing order. The Attorney…
Matter of Yellowquill
Canadian-born American Indian is protected from deportation
A Canadian citizen with at least 50 percent American Indian ancestry appealed a deportation order based on a heroin possession conviction. The Board held that section 289 of the Immigration and Nationality Act protected her from deportation. It adopted the reasoning of Akins v. Saxbe that the…
What these documents are
- The agencies: Federal workers' compensation appeals from the Department of Labor's Employees' Compensation Appeals Board (ECAB), federal-sector labor-relations cases from the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), mine-safety cases from the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission (FMSHRC), workplace-safety cases from the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC), Longshore Act and Black Lung Benefits Act appeals from the Department of Labor's Benefits Review Board (BRB), precedent decisions of the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA), environmental permit and penalty appeals from the EPA's Environmental Appeals Board (EAB), and whistleblower and other labor appeals from the Department of Labor's Administrative Review Board (ARB). Each decision page names its agency.
- Commission, Board and Authority decisions: Rulings by the agency's highest review level (the Commission at OSHRC and FMSHRC, the Authority at FLRA, the Board of Immigration Appeals, the Administrative Review Board at Labor, and the Environmental Appeals Board at EPA). These are citable as precedent, though a decision may have been appealed to a U.S. Court of Appeals after issuance.
- ALJ decisions: Rulings by the agency's Administrative Law Judges after a hearing. When no Commissioner directs review, an ALJ decision becomes a final order that binds the parties in that case but is not binding precedent: under 29 U.S.C. § 661(j) at OSHRC, and after the 40-day window of 30 U.S.C. § 823(d)(1) at FMSHRC.
- Why finality matters: Every page here says which kind of decision you are reading, so you know whether it is precedent you can cite or a final order that only shows how one judge ruled on one set of facts.
- Where they come from: Every page links the official public release from the deciding agency, and the full text on the page is that release. The plain-English summaries are written by Ezel.