Federal investigators found nearly a ton of children working poorly on a single day shift at Seaboard Triumph Foods’ red meat processing plant in Siouxtown, Iowa, the section announced.
Hired through Guymon, Oklahoma-based sanitation contractor Quest, the 11 children allegedly worked to clean head splitters, jaw pullers, bandsaws, neck clippers and alternative tools at the Seaboard Triumph Meals facility from September 2019 to September 2023. Corrosive cleaners spoiled for use, DOL says in a release release On Friday.
federal laws bans Minors may be prevented from working in meat processing due to the higher potential for trauma.
Seaboard Meals is undoubtedly one of the largest red meat producers to the population. In addition to Iowa, Seaboard Meals, a division of Seaboard Co., operates in Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Oklahoma, Texas and Utah, and Mexico, according to the company’s online website.
“These findings demonstrate a history of children working illegally at Seaboard Triumph Foods’ Sioux City facility dating back to at least September 2019. Despite changing sanitation contractors, children continued to work in hazardous occupations at this facility, ” Michael Lazzeri, Midwest regional administrator for DOL’s Pay and Future category, said within the release.
Qwest must pay $171,919 in civil financial consequences and take steps to prevent the illegal hiring of minors again.
Quest and Seaboard did not return requests for comment.
However, children under the age of 18 being illegally hired into bad jobs in meat and poultry slaughter and processing operations is not unique within the industry or to the Seaboard Food plant in Sioux Falls.
In September 2023, Seaboard reduced Fayette janitorial products and services for sanitary painting at its facility. Taking over the upcoming assignment to guarantee the plant’s sanitation services and products, Fayette reportedly worked with the Somerville, Tennessee-based contractor earlier this year, one of the most important jobs ever hired through Quest. Hired again. found employed The DOL alleged that there were 9 minors at the Sioux Town plant.
Fayette allegedly hired 15 children under the age of 13 to the Purdue Farms processing plant in Accomack, Virginia, where a 14-year-old child was seriously injured. Purdue voided its guarantee with Fayette before the DOL filed the court filing, the company said.
Are immigrant children cleaning American slaughterhouses?
The reform is part of an ongoing investigation into whether migrant children are cleaning US slaughterhouses. Additionally, less than a year later, the federal government fined another sanitation service provider $1.5 million for using more than 100 children – Age 13 to 17 years – In 13 meat processing plants in 8 states.
The DOL began its investigation close to a broadcast documenting crystal clear migrant children working overnight for contractors in poultry processing facilities on Virginia’s Eastern Shore. An unused York opportunity brochure Story Last December Crystal Clear Kids clean blood, grease and feathers from equipment with acid and power hoses.
opportunity’ Account It covers the highlights of a 14-year-old boy who was maimed while cleaning conveyor belts in the deboning department at a Purdue slaughterhouse in rural Virginia. The eighth-grade student was one of hundreds of Mexican and Central American children who crossed the border willingly to work in bad jobs.
However, it is not just migrant children doing illegal and threatening work. 16-year-old high school student Michael Schultz died last summer near Stuck in a machine at a saw mill in Wisconsin,
by an increase water slide Jacksonville, Florida, on coastal land saw machine In Clarkrange, Tennessee, federal investigators are finding children across the country being forced to do illegal work and doing dangerous, illegal work. In May, federal investigators found a 13-year-old girl allegedly running for 60 hours before an assembly line In Luverne, Alabama.
Additionally recently, DOL found A Magnificent Rapids, Michigan, window cleaning company illegally hired three children to clean residential windows and gutters and install Christmas lighting, one of whom suffered serious injuries after falling from the roof. Surgery was required upon injury. Some other DOL matter solved This past week involved meat grinders working and cleaners and children using motor cars to bring orders to a pizza restaurant in Iron River, Wisconsin.
The company said the DOL’s Pay and Future category conducted 736 investigations uncovering child labor violations affecting 4,030 children in fiscal year 2024.
Along with the government, Massachusetts’ environment recently took on companies that violated child labor laws, leading to an operator of dozens of nearby Burger King franchise locations allegedly making minors work longer than legally allowed hours. Appointed to do. One after another, Attorney General Andrea Pledger Campbell reached a settlement with the owner of disused Jersey-based Popeyes franchises throughout Massachusetts, his administrative center, to get to the bottom of similar allegations. said The ultimate past.
