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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Pettengill Family Restoration, LLC
Four construction citations vacated
Pettengill Family Restoration subcontracted crews to assemble panelized houses at residential construction sites. Four OSHA inspections produced serious and repeat-serious citations involving head and eye protection, fall protection, scaffolds, and ladders, with proposed penalties totaling $78,701…
Trinity Solar, LLC, as successor to Trinity Solar, Inc.
Head and fall protection penalties reduced
Trinity Solar employees installed solar panels on a residence in Yonkers, New York. OSHA cited a serious head-protection violation for work below solar installers and a repeat fall-protection violation for roof work 25 feet above the ground, proposing $98,216 in total penalties. Trinity withdrew…
Barry Billcliff, dba Barry James, et al.
Roofing violations and personal liability affirmed
OSHA inspected roofing work at a hotel and conference center in Devens, Massachusetts, where workers lacked required inspections, head protection, fall protection, training, and compliant ladder access. Barry Billcliff denied controlling the project or employing anyone there, but the judge found…
Arrow Plumbing, LLC
Three excavation violations affirmed, spoil-pile item vacated
Arrow Plumbing replaced a residential sewer line in Grain Valley, Missouri, using an excavation more than nine feet deep. Its owner and project supervisor worked inside without hard hats, with exposed utilities and a near-vertical wall but no trench box or other cave-in protection. The judge…
Fama Construction, LLC
Roofing case remanded for controlling-employer analysis
OSHA cited Fama Construction for inadequate inspections, missing head protection, and missing fall protection at a residential roofing project. An administrative law judge granted summary judgment to the Secretary and affirmed all three violations. The Commission agreed that no material fact was…
Rene Silverio Gonzalez/RG Roofing
Late contest dismissed and relief from final order denied
OSHA issued RG Roofing three serious citations involving head protection, residential fall protection, and ladder use, with a proposed penalty of $8,097. The company received the citation but did not submit a written notice of contest within 15 working days, so the citation became a final…
Nemeckay's Roofing and Home Improvement Company
Four roofing citations vacated for lack of employee proof
OSHA cited a sole-proprietor roofing business for alleged head, eye, fall, and ladder protection violations observed at a two-story house. The judge rejected the proprietor's claim that OSHA's observations and brief entry onto the property violated the Fourth Amendment. OSHA still had to prove that…
Juan G. Quevedo-Garcia
Corporate veil pierced for OSHA penalties
Five consolidated cases involved 33 construction violations issued to BB Frame LLC and its owner, Juan G. Quevedo-Garcia, including serious, repeat, and willful violations involving fall protection, eye and head protection, and stairways and ladders. BB Frame withdrew its contests, leaving only…
Houran USA Construction, LLC
Three serious construction citations affirmed
Houran USA Construction renovated a three-story building using a four-tier scaffold. OSHA cited the company after an inspector observed an employee without a hard hat below scaffold work, employees using a scaffold with a missing guardrail about 24 feet above the ground, and an access ladder that…
William Trahant, Jr. Construction, Inc.
Roofing violations affirmed, including willful fall protection
William Trahant, Jr. Construction performed residential roofing work where employees lacked hard hats, used inadequate fall-arrest anchorages, and had access to a defective ladder. Employees also worked at least 20 feet above the ground without being tied off, and one worker had no harness or…
Richard Hargrove d/b/a R. H. Construction
Five repeat construction items vacated for lack of employer coverage
OSHA cited R. H. Construction after observing framing work from a narrow, unsecured forklift-supported platform nearly ten feet above the ground. The workers also lacked cited head, eye, and fall protection, and OSHA alleged that one worker had not received required scaffold training. All five…
M.V.P. Piping Co., Inc.
Willful trench penalty increased to $22,000
M.V.P. Piping sent two employees into a 6-foot-4-inch-deep excavation with vertical walls and no cave-in protection. The company used gravel backfill, an exit ramp, and spotters as a temporary safety plan, but none of those measures could prevent a potentially fatal collapse. The Commission held…
Michael Buckly
Roofing citations affirmed by default
OSHA cited Michael Buckly after observing one employee removing shingles from a three-story roof without fall protection and another cleaning debris below without a protective helmet. After filing a notice of contest, Buckly did not file an answer, return the Secretary's calls, participate in the…
Lakeside Construction, L.L.C.
Framing safety violations affirmed
Lakeside Construction had three employees framing an Idaho residence without a supervisor present. One employee worked below roof-framing activity without a protective helmet, while other employees worked about 9 feet above the ground without fall protection. The employees also lacked training to…
Virginia Construction & Management Company, Inc.
Willful canopy fall violation affirmed
Two Virginia Construction employees chipped concrete on a canopy 16 feet 7 inches above a sidewalk without fall protection, safety-toe footwear, hard hats, or eye protection. They accessed the canopy by climbing an inadequately configured scaffold, and the company lacked qualified scaffold…
Altor, Inc., and/or Avcon, Inc.
Eight willful items affirmed with $412,000 penalty
OSHA cited extensive hard-hat, open-edge, and floor-hole hazards during construction of a sixteen-story concrete building. The Commission held that Altor and Avcon operated as a single employer because they shared a worksite, management, ownership, office support, and integrated operations. The…
Heff's Tuckpointing
Residential roof fall-protection violation affirmed
Heff's employee worked on a steep residential roof about eleven feet above the ground while removing bricks from a chimney without conventional fall protection. The judge found that the nearby scaffold did not reliably prevent a fall and that Heff's had not shown anchors, guardrails, or other…
Shawn Telsi, d/b/a Life Time Homes, Green Pines, and/or Telsi Builders
Excavation violations affirmed with $91,200 penalty
Telsi controlled a temple-construction site where subcontractor employees worked in a deep excavation with vertical walls, large spoil piles at the edges, no nearby safe egress, uncovered holes, defective ladders, and uncapped rebar. The judge found Telsi was both the controlling and creating…
Denny Maize Construction
Eight serious construction items affirmed
Denny Maize Construction did not appear at the hearing, and OSHA's inspection evidence was undisputed. Workers lacked hard hats and eye protection, used circular saws with blade guards wedged open, and used damaged or improperly spliced extension cords. OSHA also documented an undersized scaffold…
Decker Construction
Trench violations result in $5,625 penalty
Decker employees worked in a seven-foot excavation while relocating a fire hydrant. The company had not trained one crew member in excavation hazards, provided no ladder or constructed ramp, left spoil at the edge, and did not slope or shore the Type B soil as required. Those four items were…
Downrite Engineering Corporation
Manhole safety violations mostly affirmed
Downrite employees installed a sewer manhole invert while one employee worked at the bottom of a 10-foot manhole and another lowered cement, bricks, water, and tools from above. The judge rejected Downrite's Fourth Amendment challenge because the general contractor and Downrite supervisory…
Pegasus Tower, Inc.
Tower hoisting and hard-hat violations affirmed
Pegasus Tower was constructing a communications tower in Wisconsin when OSHA observed an employee riding a hoist line while conduit was lifted at the same time. The judge found that this practice violated the general duty clause because the tower industry recognized the fall hazard and employees…
Artistic Enterprises, Inc.
Five scaffold and hard-hat violations affirmed
Two stucco workers used a two-level scaffold without hard hats, full planking, safe ladder access, fall protection, or toeboards at an Alabama hotel project. Artistic Enterprises argued that another company employed the workers, but the judge rejected that claim based on the workers' statements…
Galluzzo Equipment & Excavating, Inc.
Most excavation violations affirmed
Galluzzo Equipment & Excavating installed a concrete catch basin and pipe in a street excavation in Lodi, New Jersey. The judge affirmed serious violations involving trench-safety training, the lack of a competent person, missing hard hats, an unsecured pneumatic-hose coupling, an unprotected spoil…
Hackensack Steel Corp.
Four steel-erection violations affirmed
Hackensack Steel was erecting structural steel at a medical-center project when two connectors worked as high as 43 feet without exterior or interior fall protection and without hardhats. Unprotected reinforcing steel also created an impalement hazard below them. The Commission rejected…
Capeway Roofing Systems, Inc.
Seven roofing violations and $111,800 affirmed
Capeway Roofing installed roofing on a firehouse with four roof levels and was cited for head protection, fall protection, monitoring, training, material storage, and defective safety equipment. The Commission found that any error in allowing two OSHA witnesses to remain in the courtroom despite a…
George B. Hardee Construction Company, Inc.
Trenching violations resulted in $36,800 in penalties
George B. Hardee Construction installed a storm sewer pipeline in an excavation in Mobile, Alabama. OSHA found two employees in Type C soil at depths exceeding five feet without cave-in protection, an adequate competent-person inspection, excavation-hazard training, or a safe means of exit. The…
Ingram Plastering and Company, Inc.
Scaffold and hard-hat violations resulted in $10,800 in penalties
Ingram Plastering employees performed exterior stucco work from scaffolding up to about 23 feet high. The judge found that work levels were not fully planked, no qualified competent person inspected the scaffold before shifts, employees did not consistently wear hard hats, and one employee lacked…
European Craft Construction, Inc.
Default affirmed three safety items and $4,000 penalty
European Craft Construction stopped participating after an initial prehearing conference. The company did not join later conference calls, return messages, help prepare the joint prehearing statement, or respond to an order to show cause. The judge found that the company had received the…
Double "A" Industries, Inc.
Roofing subcontractor's safety citations affirmed under the multi-employer worksite rule
Double "A" Industries is a small south Florida shell contractor that took a $38,000 contract to build a guardhouse and subcontracted the roofing labor out. An OSHA officer inspecting a nearby site watched roof workers for about 40 minutes without fall protection or hard hats and improperly using…
Reflections Tower Service, Inc.
Three violations affirmed and two vacated after a tower-dismantling inspection
Reflections Tower Service dismantled a communications tower in Ohio, where an employee lost two fingers after his glove was caught in hoist equipment. OSHA cited the company under the general duty clause and several construction standards. The judge vacated the general duty clause item because OSHA…
D.T. Construction Company, Inc.
Three willful trench violations affirmed, most other items upheld, $119,750 penalty
D.T. Construction is a Pennsylvania contractor that installs underground water and sewer lines. After OSHA inspected several of its dig sites in 1998, the agency issued three citations covering willful, serious, and other-than-serious violations. The heart of the case was three willful cave-in…
David Weekley Homes
General contractor citation vacated for insufficient proof and lack of knowledge
David Weekley Homes was the general contractor for residential construction at the Horizon Pointe development in Colorado. OSHA cited Weekley for nine conditions grouped into six willful items involving its safety program, hard hats, scaffold support, fall protection, guardrails, training, and…
Lancaster Enterprises, Inc., d/b/a Orbit Roofing Co.
Safety-program item vacated, glass-skylight item affirmed
Lancaster Enterprises, doing business as Orbit Roofing, was installing a rubber roof on a three-story apartment building in Massachusetts when an employee slipped near the roof edge and fell 33 feet to his death. The Commission upheld vacatur of the general safety-program item because the Secretary…
Branham Sign Company
Fall violations reduced from willful to serious
Branham Sign Company manufactured, serviced, and erected signs. A supervisor worked from an aerial-lift basket and on a sign about 64 feet above the ground without a tied-off safety harness. The Commission affirmed violations of both fall-protection standards but held that the Secretary had not…
CMC Electric, Inc.
Electrical-hazard and worksite-safety items affirmed
CMC Electric sent three journeyman wiremen to install electrical service at a cellular-telephone construction site near Andover, Ohio. An employee died after climbing a utility pole and contacting an energized 7,200-volt line that was not shown on the work schematic. CMC had not inspected for…
New England Synthetic Systems, Inc.
Scaffold and electrical violations affirmed for $30,000
New England Synthetic Systems replaced exterior walls at an apartment complex in Weymouth, Massachusetts. Judge Robert A. Yetman affirmed violations involving unprotected temporary electrical wiring, lifelines tied to vent curbing and exposed to sharp edges, incomplete scaffold planking, unsafe…
Grayhawk of America, Inc.
Four construction safety violations affirmed after employer failed to appear
OSHA cited Grayhawk of America for four serious construction safety violations involving head protection, eye and face protection, unprotected deck edges, and unguarded floor openings. The employer received notice of the hearing but did not appear or request a postponement. The compliance officer…
Kenny Niles Construction Company
Trench citations reinstated after business closure
Kenny Niles Construction Company was investigated after a trench cave-in resulted in an employee's death. OSHA issued three willful citation items involving trenching hazards, but the sole proprietor had closed his businesses and no longer had employees before the citation was issued. An…
R.K. Construction & Development Co.
All five demolition-site citations affirmed with penalties reduced to $4,250
R.K. Construction & Development Co. is a small family-owned demolition and building restoration contractor in Savannah, Georgia. While the company was tearing down a three-story building, an OSHA compliance officer driving by saw employees on a scaffold about 25 feet up and stopped to inspect. OSHA…
New England Masonry Co.
Most roofing-site citations affirmed, safety-monitor and ladder-inspection items vacated
New England Masonry Co. was replacing the flat roof on a convalescent home in Glastonbury, Connecticut, when OSHA inspected and issued a five-item serious citation. The judge affirmed most of it: a ground worker in the hoist area without a hard hat, a discharged and an overcharged fire extinguisher…
Condor Construction Company
Willful/repeat trenching citation and hard-hat citation affirmed for $23,000
Condor Construction was building a church and day-care facility in New Rochelle, New York. OSHA had already cited and settled with the company twice at the same site for leaving employees in an unprotected excavation. On a third inspection in June 1996, the compliance officer found employees again…
Walter Jensen, d/b/a S & W Construction
Willful steep-roof fall citations affirmed, one power-line item vacated
Walter Jensen, doing business as S & W Construction, ran residential roofing crews in New Hampshire. OSHA inspected two of his steep-roof jobsites about five weeks apart, both under the same foreman, and found roofers working high above the ground with no guardrails, nets, or personal fall arrest…
Commercial Wall, Inc.
Willful fall violation affirmed at one motel site
Commercial Wall, Inc. supplied framing crews for motel projects in Galesburg and Knoxville, Illinois. At the Galesburg site, the judge found Commercial was the employer because it held the framing contract, paid the workers, covered workers' compensation, and retained the right to control the work…
W. G. Kees Properties, Inc.
Eight construction safety items affirmed
W. G. Kees Properties, Inc. was cited for safety conditions at a construction site. The remaining allegations involved employees working without fall protection on a steep roof and second level, unsecured and insufficiently extended access ladders, and a stairway without required rail protection…
G-MAC Construction Company, Inc.
Willful scaffold citations reduced to serious, penalties cut sharply
G-MAC Construction Company, Inc. was the stucco subcontractor on a Comfort Inn project in Omaha, Nebraska, and in turn subcontracted the work to Eucardo Molina, whose crew worked from a 40-foot scaffold with no guardrails and climbed the frame to get on it. G-MAC argued Molina was an independent…
Franklin E. Skepton Contractor, amended to Skepton Contracting Inc.
Hard-hat and LP-gas items affirmed
Skepton was a prime contractor on a middle-school construction project. The judge affirmed a repeat hard-hat violation after the superintendent walked near a moving backhoe without head protection, finding he had access to a possible impact hazard. She vacated an eye-protection item because Skepton…
Meridian Contractors, Inc.
Dismissals reversed and citation cases remanded
OSHA issued Meridian Contractors serious and willful construction citations with proposed penalties after two inspections. The ALJ dismissed both cases under Commission precedent treating the actions as moot because Meridian had stopped employing workers and was preparing to dissolve. After that…
Powder Rock, Inc.
Hard-hat and signal items affirmed, blast-area item vacated
Powder Rock performed secondary blasting for a sewer trench project. One blast unexpectedly sent rock and debris high across the worksite, seriously injuring a general-contractor employee. The judge affirmed the hard-hat item because Powder Rock's two employees worked around recurring blasting…
Connelly Construction Corp.
Scaffold guardrail violation affirmed as willful
Connelly performed masonry work from multi-level scaffolding at a shopping mall construction site. The judge found serious violations for employees without hard hats, inadequate scaffold access, missing overhead screening above a building entrance, and unguarded stairways. The principal…
Robert Lettrick Roofing Co.
Commission approves a settlement after directing the case for review, cutting the roofing citations to a $5,600 package
Robert Lettrick Roofing Company did roofing work in the Albany, New York area. After an OSHA inspection of a steep mansion-roof job in Saratoga, New York in September 1993, the Secretary issued serious, repeat, and other-than-serious citations, and Administrative Law Judge Barbara L…
M & W Roofing Co., Inc.
Scaffold access, guardrail, and hard-hat violations affirmed for $1,100
M & W Roofing Co., Inc. worked from scaffold platforms at a Walgreens construction site in Wisconsin. An employee reached the scaffold by climbing its cross members because no ladder or equivalent safe access was provided. The 12-foot and 18-foot platforms also lacked required guardrails and…
P. A. Landers, Incorporated
Four excavation violations affirmed for $10,300, willful charge reduced to serious
P. A. Landers, Incorporated was constructing a manhole in an excavation about 8.5 feet deep beside a roadway carrying substantial traffic. Three employees worked without hard hats, bricks and concrete blocks were stored within two feet of the edge, and the access ladder extended only one foot above…
CEI West Roofing Co., Inc.
Hard-hat and traffic-sign items affirmed
CEI West Roofing Co., Inc. was cited at a Colorado roofing project where employees unloaded materials near traffic and worked on an unguarded roof. Administrative Law Judge James H. Barkley affirmed the hard-hat item because employee statements and the crew's conduct showed a practice that CEI's…
Kunz Construction Co., Inc.
Four serious excavation-safety violations affirmed
Kunz Construction Co., Inc. was inspected while working near the Alamo Dome in San Antonio, Texas. OSHA found a foreman without a hard hat, an access ladder that did not extend three feet above the excavation, an unguarded plank used as a crossing, and employees in an excavation that was neither…
Franklin E. Skepton
Twelve construction-safety violations affirmed
Franklin E. Skepton was the general contractor for a high-school addition in Pennsylvania. OSHA cited conditions including unguarded floor and wall openings, missing hard hats, unsafe compressed-gas handling, unprotected electrical equipment, unstable and unguarded scaffolds, improper gasoline…
G. Pugni & Son, Inc.
Demolition head-protection and engineering-survey items affirmed, $3,500
G. Pugni & Son was a demolition and rehabilitation subcontractor at the Walt Whitman Mall in Huntington, New York. On August 18, 1993, a suspended concrete and plaster ceiling collapsed onto two workers who were tearing it down, and OSHA inspected after a news-media referral. The agency issued…
Roberts Pipeline Construction, Inc.
$30,800 in penalties affirmed for eight violations
Roberts Pipeline challenged only the penalties assessed for eight serious violations involving training, head protection, compressed-gas storage, electrical grounding, trench access and inspection, and cave-in protection. The Commission held that the judge had considered the statutory factors of…
T & S Utilities, Inc.
Training, ladder, hard-hat, and fatality-reporting violations affirmed
T & S Utilities installed sewage-pump-station lines in Fort Myers, Florida, and employees worked inside manholes at the site. The judge vacated a general duty clause allegation because a specific confined-space training standard covered the condition and the record did not show actual atmospheric…
Blankenship & Lee Pipeline Co., Inc.
Trenching and hazard-communication violations affirmed
Blankenship & Lee Pipeline was reconstructing sewer lines for a pumping station in Pelham, Georgia. An employee worked in a vertical trench that measured between 5 feet 4 inches and 6 feet deep without a ladder, adequate cave-in protection, or a hard hat; loose spoil was stored only inches from 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.