Federal agency decisions, searchable in plain English.
Workplace-safety cases from the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) and mine-safety cases from the Federal Mine Safety and Health Review Commission (FMSHRC), each with a plain-English summary, the standards it cites, and whether it counts as precedent. More agencies are coming.
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Lloyd Industries, Inc.
Machine guarding and health violations largely affirmed
Lloyd Industries manufactured fire dampers and HVAC products at a Pennsylvania plant where a former employee's fingers were amputated by a press brake. OSHA's safety and health inspections identified unguarded machine points of operation and power-transmission parts, improperly closed electrical…
Crown Cork & Seal USA, Inc.
Press-cleaning violations affirmed and pathogen items vacated
An employee lost a finger while cleaning a running can-end press near the unguarded rear of a pulley. The judge found it reasonably predictable that employees would clean beyond the machine's front because they had done so regularly and were never clearly prohibited from cleaning the rear. Crown…
St. Lawrence Food Corp., dba Primo Foods
Most dairy-plant health and safety citations affirmed
OSHA conducted health and safety inspections at Primo Foods, a kosher dairy, and cited hazards involving ammonia refrigeration, respirators, confined spaces, chemical training, noise, machine guarding, electrical work, lockout/tagout, powered industrial trucks, and recordkeeping. The ALJ found that…
Lewis County Dairy Corp.
Widespread safety violations result in $72,750 penalty
OSHA found extensive safety deficiencies at Lewis County Dairy's kosher dairy plant, including missing safety programs, inadequate lockout practices, unguarded equipment, electrical hazards, deficient fall protection, and insufficient hazard communication. Of the 33 serious citation items, the…
Luna Tech, Inc.
Settlement approved with $50,000 in combined penalties
The two cases arose from OSHA inspections of Luna Tech's fireworks-manufacturing plant, including an inspection after explosions and fires injured three employees and one later died. While the cases were under Commission review, the parties settled all remaining issues. The Secretary withdrew…
North Atlantic Fish Company, Inc.
Broad fish-plant safety violations affirmed
OSHA's safety and health inspections of North Atlantic's Massachusetts fish-processing plant identified extensive fire, machine, electrical, chemical, respiratory, noise, storage, and powered-industrial-truck hazards. The judge affirmed most of the serious items, including general duty violations…
C-Post
Willful lockout and guarding citations cut to serious after a small fence-post maker's amputation injury
C-Post is a small Montana company that makes wooden fence posts and furniture legs from logs, employing about 10 people. After a worker's left hand was severed in a doweler machine, OSHA inspected and issued a long list of serious, willful, repeat, and other-than-serious citations covering…
Kaspar Wire Works, Inc.
Commission upholds most willful recordkeeping violations but vacates unsupported items
Kaspar Wire Works manufactured formed wire products at a Shiner, Texas facility with roughly 850 to 900 employees. After a 1990 inspection, OSHA cited more than 400 alleged violations and proposed $1,236,000 in penalties; the ALJ affirmed most items and assessed $257,700. The Commission found that…
Dillard Texas Operating Limited Partnership, and its successors
Floor and emergency-preparedness items affirmed
OSHA cited a Dillard's store for damaged floors and walls, locked or poorly fitting exits, emergency-planning deficiencies, inadequate fire-extinguisher training, machine guarding, and electrical conditions. Judge James H. Barkley affirmed an other-than-serious passageway violation because…
Aero Tec Laboratories, Inc.
Plant safety items largely affirmed with reduced penalties
Aero Tec manufactured fuel tanks and containment vessels at its New Jersey plant. The judge rejected its claim that OSHA had promised no penalties or exceeded the scope of consent because management accompanied the open inspection without objecting. The decision affirmed items involving an…
Miniature Nut and Screw Corp.
Hearing-conservation lapses are serious violations, but machine-guarding items fail for lack of employee exposure
Miniature Nut and Screw Corporation is a small family-owned maker of die-cast zinc fasteners in Newington, Connecticut, with about ten employees. After a 1993 OSHA inspection, the company was cited for occupational-noise (hearing conservation) violations and numerous machine-guarding violations…
Dream Set Fashion, Inc.
$5,500 penalty affirmed for six serious violations
Dream Set Fashion manufactured women's apparel in New York City and contested only the $5,500 penalty for six serious violations. The conditions involved a covered exit sign, unguarded fan blades, an unguarded rotating shaft, an unguarded sewing-machine pulley, missing grounding pins, and an open…
Kaspar Electroplating Corp.
Commission affirms three machine-guarding violations and vacates drill-press items
OSHA cited Kaspar Electroplating after inspecting its Shiner, Texas facility. On review, the Commission rejected Kaspar's argument that the citation was untimely, finding that OSHA issued it within six months of discovering the uncorrected conditions. It also held that a compliance officer may…
Art Specialty Company
Lamp manufacturer receives mixed ruling and $5,700 penalty
OSHA cited Art Specialty Company, a 29-employee lamp manufacturer, for numerous serious and other-than-serious conditions. The judge vacated a stairway citation because the Secretary did not prove employees used the stairs, and vacated the metal-shear portion of a machine-guarding item because the…
Southeastern Paper Products Export
Machine-guarding items vacated, exit-sign items affirmed
Southeastern Paper Products operated a paper-converting facility in Miami, Florida. OSHA cited unguarded slitter blades and drill-press belts and pulleys, but the judge vacated those items because the Secretary relied on assumptions and did not prove that employees entered the danger zones during…
Conagra Flour Milling Company
Commission splits flour-mill safety citations and assesses $500
Conagra operated a flour-milling facility in Martins Creek, Pennsylvania, where OSHA cited battery servicing, powered industrial trucks, machine guarding, compressed-air cleaning, and grain-handling practices. The Commission vacated the personal-protective-equipment and eyewash items because OSHA's…
Alaska Trawl Fisheries, Inc.
OSHA jurisdiction over factory vessels affirmed
Alaska Trawl Fisheries and Golden Age Fisheries operated vessels that caught and processed fish near Dutch Harbor, Alaska. OSHA cited machine guarding, passageway, recordkeeping, welding-gas storage, and hazard-communication conditions aboard the vessels. The companies stipulated to the violations…
Capra Industries, Inc.
Settlement withdrew machine, electrical, and chemical citations
Capra Industries manufactured jewelry and music boxes and was cited after OSHA inspected its workplace. The citations addressed an unguarded pulley, an ungrounded receptacle, hazard communication deficiencies, and failure to post an OSHA notice. After review was directed, the parties reached a full…
Armour Food Company
Two guarding items affirmed and six items vacated
OSHA cited multiple conditions at Armour's meat-processing plant, and the Commission reviewed selected personal-protective-equipment, machine-guarding, power-transmission, centrifuge, and compressed-gas items. It vacated the mesh-glove item because OSHA did not prove that sharpening slicer blades…
Harrison Furniture Manufacturing Company
Commission approves withdrawal of all citations
OSHA cited Harrison Furniture Manufacturing Company for numerous conditions at its Arkansas furniture plant after an inspection conducted under a warrant. The earlier litigation addressed whether evidence from a plant-wide inspection should be suppressed when the warrant application was based on…
Robert K. Bell Enterprises
Amusement-park guarding case remanded after evidence admitted
Bell operated an amusement park where OSHA cited unguarded pulleys and belts on the Scrambler ride. An administrative law judge invalidated the inspection warrant, suppressed the inspection evidence, and vacated the citation for lack of proof that Bell affected interstate commerce. The Commission…
Clement Food Company
Stacking, pulley, and platform items affirmed; forklift and fan items vacated
Clement Food bottled food products at an Oklahoma City plant and contested several storage, forklift, machine, electrical, and fall-protection items. The Commission affirmed a citation for a leaning 15-foot stack of boxes and a serious pulley-guarding violation, reducing the pulley penalty to $70…
B. F. Goodrich Textile Products, a Division of The B. F. Goodrich Co.
Employer knowledge supplied adequate notice of machine violations
B. F. Goodrich manufactured tire cord and related products at a large Georgia textile plant. OSHA cited unguarded card-machine pulleys, unguarded loom sprockets and chains, fire extinguishers mounted too high, and missing signed crane-inspection reports without identifying every machine or…
Command Trucking & Warehouse Corp.
Failure-to-abate penalties reduced from $1,960 to $300
A reinspection found that Command Trucking had not timely corrected four previously final conditions involving a locked exit, a floor hole, an ungrounded portable battery charger, and an inadequately guarded compressor drive. The judge rejected the company's claim that Customs Service rules…
The House of Glass
Seven equipment and electrical items affirmed
The House of Glass operated a retail glass and glazing business in Great Falls, Montana. OSHA cited conditions involving a discharged fire extinguisher, a radial saw, an unguarded pulley, blocked electrical equipment, and three ungrounded appliances or machines. The Commission found the record…
Boise Cascade Corporation
Sawmill drive-guarding violations affirmed
Boise Cascade operated sawmill equipment with inadequately guarded belts, pulleys, chains, and sprockets. The Commission found that employees had access to the merry-go-round drive and to the resaw and conveyor drives, including during jam clearing, cleanup, maintenance, and travel between work…
Ricardo Correa, Jr., d/b/a Ricardo's Mexican Enterprises of Omaha
Masa-feeder failure-to-abate penalties vacated
Ricardo's Mexican Enterprises produced Mexican food in Omaha, Nebraska. OSHA initially cited conditions involving a masa feeder after a young employee was fatally injured while cleaning the machine, and the uncontested citation became final. In the later failure-to-abate case, the Commission found…
Collator Corporation
Press-brake subitems vacated and remaining citation affirmed
Collator Corporation manufactured collating machines at a Seattle plant. Its notice of contest referred only to the proposed penalties, but its answer and statements at the hearing showed that it also intended to contest two press-brake guarding subitems. The Commission therefore treated those…
Worcester Pressed Steel Company
Duplicate aisle item vacated, higher penalties sustained
Worcester Pressed Steel Company operated a large metal-stamping plant cited for 40 nonserious safety violations. The cited conditions included poor housekeeping and floors, obstructed and unmarked aisles, missing exit signs and eye protection, forklift hazards, inadequate machine guarding, and…
Allstate Trailer Sales, Inc.
Penalties reassessed after citations became final
Allstate Trailer Sales manufactured recreational vehicles at a Seattle plant. OSHA issued a serious citation involving unguarded saws and an eleven-item nonserious citation covering posting, recordkeeping, machine guarding, electrical grounding, and eye protection. Allstate's timely notice…
Sequoyah Spinning Mills, Inc.
Plant penalties affirmed and noise penalties vacated
Sequoyah Spinning Mills manufactured carpet yarn at a plant with 246 employees. In docket 1012, the company admitted 16 nonserious conditions involving housekeeping, combustible materials, fire protection, chemical protection, machine guarding, compressed air, welding cylinders, and electrical…
St. Mary's Cotton Mill, Division of Leshner Corporation
Nineteen plant violations affirmed
St. Mary's Cotton Mill admitted 19 nonserious conditions involving compressed air, machine guards, fire extinguishers, electrical grounding, exits, floor openings, storage, housekeeping, and other plant equipment. OSHA proposed penalties on ten of the items, totaling $375, and no penalties on the…
Lundell Manufacturing Co., Inc.
Gasoline vent classified as serious with a $25 penalty
Lundell Manufacturing had an underground gasoline tank whose vent ended 6 feet 7 inches above the ground instead of the required 12 feet. The vent was outside, about 75 feet from the building, protected by a guard and fence, and away from regular employee work, and the company had it extended…
Jaso-Carol Dress Co., Inc.
Dismissal reversed after proof of service was found
OSHA cited Jaso-Carol Dress for four non-serious violations involving fan guards, exit signs, sewing-machine drives, and an electrical junction box, with a $30 penalty on one item. The judge dismissed the company's contest because the case record appeared not to contain proof that its filings had…
Jaso-Carol Dress Co., Inc.
Contest reinstated after filing oversight
Jaso-Carol Dress timely contested four nonserious items involving fan guards, exit-sign illumination, exposed sewing-machine drives, and an uncovered junction box. The judge dismissed the contest because the record appeared not to contain proof that the contest and answer had been served on the…
What these documents are
- Commission decisions: Rulings by the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission itself, the highest level of agency review. These are citable as Commission precedent, though a decision may have been appealed to a U.S. Court of Appeals after issuance.
- ALJ decisions: Rulings by OSHRC Administrative Law Judges after a hearing. When no Commissioner directs review, an ALJ decision becomes a final order under 29 U.S.C. § 661(j): it binds the parties in that case but is not binding precedent in other cases.
- 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 OSHRC public release, and the full text on the page is that release. The plain-English summaries are written by Ezel.