Big Coal's Massey Energy Fined for Deaths

The deal was cut to avoid prosecution of the company. $10.8 million is slightly more than a wrist-slap, but it isn't likely to stop Massey or any other coal company from continuing to feed its human serfs to the insatiable maw of the fossil fuel gods.

Only company execs spending many years in maximum-security federal prisons with other rapists and murderers will accomplish that.

From Page One Kentucky:

Today the Mine Safety and Health Administration fined Massey Energy (its subsidiary, Performance Coal) $10,825,368 following an investigation into the April 2010 Upper Big Branch mine disaster that left 29 dead. Some 369 citations and orders were issued. 21 flagrant violations, which carry the most serious civil penalties under the law, were part of that.

“The tragic explosion at Upper Big Branch left dozens of families without husbands, fathers, brothers and sons,” said Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis. “I made a pledge to the families of those we lost, and the entire mining community, to conduct the most complete and thorough investigation possible in order to find the cause of this disaster. The results of the investigation lead to the conclusion that PCC/Massey promoted and enforced a workplace culture that valued production over safety, and broke the law as they endangered the lives of their miners. By issuing the largest fine in MSHA’s history, I hope to send a strong message that the safety of miners must come first.”

The announcement comes as part of a non-prosecution agreement with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in West Virginia, the DOJ and Massey/its various company names. It includes nearly $210 million for remedial safety measures at all Massey mines, a trust fund for improvements in mine safety and health, payment of outstanding civil penalties for all former Massey mines and restitution payments for victims’ families. The agreement, according to the White House, resolves criminal liability for Massey/Alpha but doesn’t provide protection against criminal prosecution of any individuals.

Read the whole thing.

And oh, yes: evil, liberal, job-killing, freedom-strangling Big Gubmint regalashuns are responsible for that fine, and for any prosecutions of the individual company executives whose actions - and refusals to act - caused the deaths of those miners.