Worker bled to death after getting 'trapped' in machine at recycling plant
dailystar.co.ukCourt, managing director Stephen Jones, 60, denied the manslaughter of his employee Norman Butler by gross negligence.The jury was told how Butler, 60, of Prestatyn, had only worked for the firm for about a month, with his job being to collect cardboard waste and bring it back to Tir Llwyd to put into bales.The court heard how safety was “shockingly bad” at the recycling plant, Wales Online reports.It was so poor that the manager of Recycle Cymru Ltd (RCL) didn’t even have the machine’s 78-page safety manual to hand and lied to a health and safety inspector the day before the accident.Prosecutor Craig Hassall QC said Mr Butler, a father-of-three, collected cardboard in his van on November 30, 2017, and took it back along the A55 to RCL.A conveyor belt sloped up toward the ceiling.
Cardboard would go along it and drop into a hopper container, three and a half metres off the ground. It would go into the hopper, down a chute and into the hydraulic bailing machine to be crushed into square bales tired with wire.But sometimes there were blockages in the hopper and staff, including the managing director, would walk up the conveyor belt to unblock it.
At the top, staff held a rope attached to a beam on the ceiling and “jumped” up and down on the cardboard in the hopper, the prosecutor said.CCTV footage showed Mr Butler walking up the conveyor belt.
He may have slipped or fallen into the hopper. Witness Paul King said he arrived at 7.18pm and saw Mr Butler’s van and the baling machine on.
Read more on dailystar.co.uk
