Courts

Thorntons Recycling fined €60,000 over death of employee

Company admits refuse collection vehicle was defective and unsafe at time of Tomasz Orzel’s death

A representative from Thorntons Recycling, with a registered office on Henry Road, Park West Business Park, Dublin 12, pleaded guilty on behalf of the company. Photograph: Bryan O'Brien

Sonya McLean
Mon Apr 8 2024 - 18:33

A recycling company has been fined €60,000 for breaches of health and safety following the death of an employee in Dublin four years ago.

Padraig Thornton Waste Disposal Limited, trading as Thorntons Recycling, admitted that a refuse collection vehicle that was collecting recycling wheelie bins in Dún An Óir estate at Old Bawn, Tallaght was defective and unsafe on March 19th, 2020.

Dublin Circuit Criminal Court heard that Tomasz Orzel, who worked for Thorntons Recycling at the time, died after he was struck by the truck while he and a colleague were collecting the wheelie bins for the vehicle that morning.

A victim impact statement prepared by Mr Orzel’s partner was handed into court but not read aloud.

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The court heard that the vehicle in question had defects, in that platforms, known as footboards, which workers stand on while the vehicle was collecting bins, were in bad condition.

Subsequent analysis of the vehicle also found that a proximity sensor switch, a safety feature which prevents the vehicle from reversing and travelling at speeds in excess of 30km/h while these footboards are down and in use, was defective and had been interfered with.

The court heard that plastic cable ties had been wrapped around these switches and aluminium can pull rings had been put placed on them. Additional wires had also been installed to short out the system.

The court heard that this rendered the proximity sensor switch defective, meaning the safety feature on the vehicle had been bypassed to suggest to the driver of the truck that there was no one standing on the footboards. Had the switch been working effectively the vehicle could not have been put in reverse which was how Mr Orzel was struck.

Antonia Boyle BL , prosecuting, told the court that a report prepared following the inspection of the vehicle concluded that the footboards were damaged, Perspex windows which should have been fitted on the back of the vehicle were missing and the proximity switch had been interfered with.

The fact that the switch had been disabled meant that the vehicle was not going to detect people standing on the back of the vehicle.

The court heard that the vehicle had passed an external inspection two months earlier.

A representative from Thorntons Recycling, with a registered office on Henry Road, Park West Business Park, Dublin 12, pleaded guilty on behalf of the company to failing to manage and conduct work activities, specifically the operation of the vehicle by employees in relation to a place of work under its control in that the vehicle was defective and unsafe, specifically that the near side footboard and off side footboard were damaged, the footboard sensory system was not functioning because it had been altered to frustrate the proximity sensor switch, the off side proximity sensor switch was not working and two Perspex windows which are fitted in the side panels of the bin lifter at the rear of the vehicle were missing. This was in breach of the Section 8 (1) of the Safety Health and Welfare at Work Act 2005.

The representative also pleaded guilty to contravention of Regulation 31C of the Safety, Health and Welfare (General Application) Regulations in relation to the same defect on the same vehicle in that the vehicle was not maintained in such a way as to reduce the risk to the users of the work equipment and to other persons at work.

The company has two previous convictions which were dealt with in both the District Court and the Circuit Court.

Judge Martin Nolan expressed his sympathies to Mr Orzel’s family and said that the prosecution arose out of a tragic incident because “through negligence the truck reversed over the unfortunate deceased”. He noted that this was “a huge loss” to Mr Orzel’s family particularly his wife and son.

He accepted that the pleas of guilty were entered in relation to “certain defects that were identified on the truck”.

Judge Nolan said “somebody had interfered with the mechanism and electrics on the lorry” that allowed the safety feature to be bypassed.

“Somebody knew how to do this and did it for their own reasons,” Judge Nolan commented after noting that it allowed the lorry to operate with greater speed and to reverse.

He acknowledged evidence that Thorntons recycling are a good company “that have the safety of their employees at their heart” and accepted that with almost 800 employees and hundreds of vehicles, “they seem to take health and safety seriously”.

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