A California-based tuna company and two managers were charged this week with violating work safety regulations after a worker was found dead inside an industrial oven filled with 12,000 pounds of tuna, the Associated Press reported.
Jose Melena was found dead inside the 35-foot-long pressure cooker at the Bumble Bee Foods plant in Santa Fe Springs in October 2012 after employees noticed he was missing and conducted a search, according to the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health.
It was later determined that Melena, 62, was doing maintenance work inside the massive oven when a coworker, who thought Melena was in the bathroom, filled it with tuna and turned it on. Temperatures inside the oven reached 270 degrees.
On Monday, Los Angles prosecutors charged Bumble Bee Foods with three counts of violating Occupational Safety & Health Administration rules that caused a death.
Angel Rodriguez, operations director at the Santa Fe Springs plant and former safety manager Saul Florez face the same charges.
Prosecutors say all three defendants knowingly violated requirements to implement a safety plan, rules for employees entering confined spaces and rules for keeping machines off while someone is working on it, the AP reported.
Cases of deaths from workplace violations are rarely prosecuted. Of 189 workplace death investigations in 2013, only 29 were referred to prosecutors and charges were filed in only 14.
Bumble Bee Foods, which faces a $1.5 million fine if convicted, said it has since improved its safety conditions, according to the AP.
"We remain devastated by the loss of our colleague Jose Melena in the tragic accident," the company said. "We disagree with and are disappointed by the charges filed by the Los Angeles district attorney's office."
Rodriguez and Florez face up to three years in prison and $250,000 in fines, the AP reported. Florez declined to comment, while Rodriguez was not immediately available for comment.
