Calls Renewed for Criminal Prosecution of Workplace Deaths

But criminal negligence under the so-called Westray provision is “very difficult” to prove when workers killed, experts say

By Gordon Hoekstra, Vancouver Sun

When the B.C. Criminal Justice Branch announced earlier this month that no charges would be laid in a deadly sawmill explosion in Burns Lake, the families of the two victims killed in the explosion were outraged.

They could not believe that there would be no legal reckoning for the deaths of Robert Luggi Jr., 45, and Carl Charlie, 42.

Each man had three children who are devastated, said Lucy Campbell, Carl’s sister. “They want some kind of justice,” she said.

In addition to the deaths of Luggi Jr. and Charlie, 20 workers were injured in the Jan. 20, 2012 blast at the Babine Forest Products sawmill, which is majority-owned by Oregon-based Hampton Affiliates.

The question of justice as it relates to deaths in the workplace has become a pointed one in the aftermath of the Crown’s decision.

As often happens in cases where charges are rejected, labour groups have renewed calls for a more focused and tougher approach to investigating and prosecuting workplace deaths. Last year in British Columbia, 149 workers died from injuries or diseases.

Three months after the Burns Lake blast, an explosion at a Lakeland Mills plant in Prince George killed two workers and injured 23. WorkSafeBC is expected to hand over that investigation file to the Crown next month for potential charges.

Groups such as the 450,000-strong B.C. Federation of Labour and the United Steelworkers want the so-called Westray Mine provision in Canada’s Criminal Code to be called on more often to prosecute companies and its officers with criminal workplace negligence.

Legislation to create the workplace criminal negligence offence was drafted after a in 1992 explosion at Nova Scotia’s Westray underground coal mine killed 26 men.

Complete article in the Vancouver Sun

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