Wal-Mart Fined $7,000 for Trampled Employee's Death

Remember Jdimytai Damour (pictured), that Wal-Mart worker who was trampled to death by shoppers at the Long Island Wal-Mart where he worked during a post-Thanksgiving sale? The U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has finally made a ruling on it. They cited Wal-Mart for "failure to implement reasonable and effective crowd management principles." Their fine: $7,000, which OSHA says is "the maximum penalty amount for a serious violation allowed under the law." Wal-Mart may contest this penalty.

Labor site CtW Connect finds this insufficient. "A man is dead," says Jason Lefkowitz. "Walmart could have -- should have -- prevented it. And their punishment is a $7,000 fine." Still, Lefkowitz tells us, Wal-Mart got stiffer punishment than Deltic Timber, whose worker Jeremy Foster got his shirt caught in a piece of machinery at Deltic's Ola, Arkansas sawmill and was strangled to death in 2004. Their fine was $2,250.

Damour's death led the city council to enact a "doorbuster" bill which gives the city some oversight and notification when a local store holds a potentially lethal supersale like the one that killed Damour.