BIRMINGHAM, England—The owner and a manager of an English scrap metal recycling plant were sentenced to nine months in jail Monday for safety lapses after a wall collapsed and killed five migrant workers in 2016, a government workplace safety agency said.
Wayne Hawkeswood and Graham Woodhouse were convicted in Birmingham Crown Court of violating the Health and Safety at Work Act, the Health and Safety Executive said.
The workers died instantly when the 50-ton (45-metric ton) wall toppled onto them at the start of their shift at Hawkeswood Metal Recycling on July 7, 2016. They had to be identified by their fingerprints.
A breath of wind could have knocked over the wall, the court was told. Investigators found other unstable walls at the site, as well as inadequate training and poor safety records….