U.S. labor officials found that 102 children worked dangerous overnight jobs cleaning slaughterhouses for Packers, one of the country's largest food sanitation companies.
The Labor Department announced a $1.5M settlement with Packers Sanitation Services, which claimed that it no longer employs any of the children, or the managers who hired them.
- The settlement is based on guidelines laid out in the Fair Labor Standards Act, which allows for a penalty of $15,318 for each child that was illegally employed.
- The Labor Department said that the children were using "caustic chemicals to clean razor-sharp saws" in slaughterhouses in eight states.
- Packers employs ~17,000 workers across 700 U.S. sites.
- Packers signed a consent decree with the Labor Department in December after federal investigators found that it employed 50 children who were working at slaughterhouses.
- As a result, the company agreed to work with a compliance specialist on child labor audits; it will share the results of those audits with the Labor Department for three years.
- In January, Department of Homeland Security officials said that federal investigators were looking into the possibility that some of the children were human trafficking victims.
