A chicken processing company and a staffing agency that allowed a teenager to clean machines at a Hattiesburg plant, leading to his death, have landed on a national list of unsafe and reckless employers.

The National Council for Occupational Safety and Health assembled its “Dirty Dozen” list compiled through nominations and released its report Thursday during Workers' Memorial Week.

“These are unsafe and reckless employers, risking the lives of workers and communities by failing to eliminate known, preventable hazards – and in at least one case, actively lobbying against better protections for workers,” the report states.

More than half of the companies included on the list have locations in Mississippi.

Marc-Jac Poultry and Onin Staffing

Onin Staffing hired 16-year-old Duvan Perez and placed him at the Mar-Jac Poultry plant in Hattiesburg. The night of July 14, 2023, he died after being pulled into a deboning machine.

Federal law prohibits children from working in dangerous conditions such as meat processing plants, especially because of the machinery. In January, OSHA cited Mar-Jac for 17 violations relating to the teenager's death and proposed over $212,000 in penalties.

Mar-Jac said it relied on Onin to verify employees' age, qualifications and training, and Onin denied being Duvan's employer, according to court records. An attorney for Mar-Jac told NBC News the teenager used identification of a 32-year-old man to get the job.

In February, Duvan's mother filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Mar-Jac and Onin in the Forrest County Circuit Court. Responding to the complaint, both companies denied most of the allegations.

“The plaintiff's decedent's negligence was the sole and/or proximate contributing cause of plaintiff's injuries,” Mar-Jac states in its response to the complaint.

Since 2020, two other workers have died at the Hattiesburg poultry plant, and workers have suffered amputations and other injuries, according to court records.

To date, OSHA has cited Mar-Jac nearly 40 times for violations in the past decade, according to agency records.

Tyson Foods

The company has operations across the country, including two mills in Carthage and Ceres, as well as hatcheries, feed mills, truck stops and other offices across Mississippi.

The report said six workers have died since 2019 and over 140 have been injured from ammonia leaks, none of them in Mississippi. The gas is often used to refrigerate meat, and according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, exposure to the gas in high doses can be fatal.

The report also said the company is under investigation for child labor violations, assigning children to work in dangerous high-risk jobs, which is illegal.

In the past decade, OSHA has issued over 300 citations against Tyson, according to agency records.

When asked about what it takes to get companies with a poor history of worker safety to protect employees, Jessica Martinez, co-executive director of COSH, said change is needed from all fronts, including having government agencies like Occupational Health and Safety Administration conduct routine inspections.

She said workers are too fearful to complain. “They need these jobs for survival. Workers are fearful of losing their jobs,” she said.

Uber and Lyft

Nationwide, over 80 drivers for the rideshare apps have been killed on the job since 2017, according to Gig Workers Rising. The report says this is a sign that drivers are pressured to accept unsafe riders.

Internal documents have shown 24,000 “alleged assaults and threats of assault” against Uber drivers, and workers of color and immigrants experience most of the danger, according to the report.

JC Muhammad, a Lyft driver and organizer with the Chicago Gig Alliance, was physically assaulted by a passenger, and said the companies need a complete overhaul in how they protect drivers, including verification of passenger identification.

In his situation, another person, allegedly the mother of the passenger, called for the ride. There was no verification for the person, and the passenger did not have an ID. Muhammad said he had no way to report what happened to police because he lacked the necessary information.

“We've had drivers robbed, assaulted, shot at,” he said during a Thursday press conference. “There are no protections, no protocols.”

In Mississippi, several drivers have been injured, including a woman grabbed by a drunk passenger in Ocean Springs in 2019; a man assaulted by his passenger in Oxford in 2021 and a woman driver shot in the head by a passenger in Gulfport in 2023.

Two other companies included in the report are Waffle House and Walmart, which were cited for inadequate security to protect workers and customers and a lack of worker protections. Both have locations in Mississippi and have had incidents occur here, including shootings and fights.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

Former Mississippi Today reporter Isabelle Taft has been named as a 2024 Livingston Award finalist in the local reporting division for her investigation into Mississippi's practice of jailing people who have not been charged with a crime and are in need of mental health treatment.

The award recognizes the best reporting by young journalists.

“Committed to Jail,” a 2023 Mississippi Today and ProPublica investigation, revealed that Mississippi counties jail hundreds of people without criminal charges every year, for days or weeks at a time, solely because they may need mental health treatment — a practice that has resulted in 14 deaths since 2006 and is unique in scope in the United States. Taft was named as a finalist along with ProPublica counterparts Agnel Philip and Mollie Simon.

Mississippi Today found that in just 19 of the state's 82 counties, people were jailed without charges more than 2,000 times over four years. Taft spoke with 14 Mississippians about their experiences in jail and learned that people detained for being sick are generally treated the same as people accused of crimes. She obtained Mississippi Bureau of Investigation reports on jail deaths and pored over lawsuits and news clips to identify 15 people who died after being jailed during this process since 2006, (including the most recent death in January, after the original series was published). And she surveyed behavioral health officials and disability rights advocates in all 50 states to show that Mississippi stands alone.

Taft was selected from thousands of applicants as a 2024-2025 fellow at The New York Times beginning this summer. She will cover national news.

The winner will be announced in June.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

April 26, 1964

Civil rights activists started the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party to challenge Mississippi's all-white regular delegation to the Democratic National Convention. 

The regulars had already adopted this resolution: “We oppose, condemn and deplore the Civil Rights Act of 1964 … We believe in separation of the races in all phases of our society. It is our belief that the separation of the races is necessary for the peace and tranquility of all the people of Mississippi, and the continuing good relationship which has existed over the years.” 

In reality, Black Mississippians had been victims of intimidation, harassment and violence for daring to try and vote as well as laws passed to disenfranchise them. As a result, by 1964, only 6% of Black Mississippians were permitted to vote. A year earlier, activists had run a mock election in which thousands of Black Mississippians showed they would vote if given an opportunity. 

In August 1964, the Freedom Party decided to challenge the all-white delegation, saying they had been illegally elected in a segregated process and had no intention of supporting President Lyndon B. Johnson in the November election. 

The prediction proved true, with White Mississippi Democrats overwhelmingly supporting Republican candidate Barry Goldwater, who opposed the Civil Rights Act. While the activists fell short of replacing the regulars, their courageous stand led to changes in both parties.

This article first appeared on Mississippi Today and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.