New York Construction Accident Law Blog : New York Construction Injury Lawyer & Attorney : Turley, Redmond & Rosasco Law Firm : Injuries & Scaffold Accidents : Brooklyn, Queens, Long Island, Nassau, Suffolk, Bronx, Staten Island

William Lattarullo being led into court in Brooklyn (courtesy of the New York Times)

His name was Lauro Ortega, and like millions before him, he came to America looking for a better life.  Instead, he died in a trench in Brooklyn, crushed to death in a tragic construction site accident.

Now Mr. Ortega's family, still grieving over the loss of their loved one, has received another harsh blow.  The man accused of  manslaughter in their loved ones death was acquitted of all criminal charges stemming from the incident.

It all started two years ago in March, 2008. Mr. Ortega, an undocumented worker from Ecuador, had been hired by William Lattarullo to dig a foundation for a new coin laundry he wanted to build.  The site for the coin laundry was located right next door to a home that Mr. Lattarulo also owned.

But according to a report in the New York Times, prosecutors said that instead of listening to warnings from other workers and a consultant that the trench Mr. Ortega was digging was unstable, Mr. Lattarulo urged Mr. Ortega to keep digging. As result,  prosecutors say part of the wall from the home collapsed and crashing rubble onto Mr. Ortega, crushing him to death. 

The Brooklyn District Attorney’s position was that because Mr. Lattarulo callously ignored warnings that the site was dangerous, he was guilty of manslaughter, and they charged him accordingly.  Brooklyn DA Charles J. Hynes hoped that convicting Lattarulo would send a message to other New York City builders that ignoring safety at construction sites is risky in more ways than one - it could put them behind bars.   Although the acquittal is a blow to the Ortega family, their fight for justice is by no means over. 

The Ortega family has filed a civil lawsuit  against Mr. Lattarulo.  This is similar to the outcome in the O.J. Simpson criminal case, where O.J. was acquitted in criminal court, but later found liable for millions of dollars in damages in the civil lawsuit.  Let's hope that the Ortega family has hired a top notch construction accident attorney  to prevail in the civil trial.

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(Courtesy of Your Nabe.com)

The Queens Borough Commissioner for the NYC Department of Buildings recently took a break from his office in Kew Gardens, New York. Mr. Ira Gluckman put on a hard hat and rode a hoist to the 14th floor of a building under construction in Flushing, Queens.

When Mr. Gluckman reached the 14th floor of the building, he climbed out of the hoist to talk to the construction workers about workplace safety   According to an article in Your Nabe.com, Mr. Gluckman told the workers: “Safety is the number one thing, We want everyone to be able to go home every night to their families and to collect a paycheck and to be able to return to work in the morning.”   Mr. Gluckman's visit to the construction site was part of Site Safety Week, an effort by the Department of Buildings to raise awareness about Queens construction worker accidents across the city.

Mr. Gluckman is right - construction site safety is number one.  But while chatting with construction workers at a building under construction might make for a " good photo op" , it isn’t doing much towards making New York’s construction sites safer.

That’s because the real problem is not whether construction workers are wearing their hardhats or not - it's unscrupulous general contractors who risk the lives of the city’s workers for the sake of profit, and who see paying fines issued by the Department of Buildings simply as part of the cost of doing business.

The facts speak for themselves.  After a crane accident in March, 2008, in which seven people were killed, the Bloomberg administration responded by issuing new protocols, increased inspections, and a new commissioner of the Department of Buildings.  And yet, only a few months later in May 2008, another crane collapsed in New York's Upper East Side, and killed two more people. And sadly, that dangerous trend is continuing.

Our new Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. is taking the right approach. He’s not just talking tough, he recently threw the book at the crane company owner  from the May 2008 crane crash and charged him with manslaughter.

It’s a nice gesture for the Queens Borough Building's Commissioner to chat with construction workers about construction accident prevention.  But until the Department of Buildings starts taking accident prevention seriously, more New York construction workers are going to continue to suffer needless injuries and deaths.

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