Two company directors have been jailed for nine months after five workers died when a wall collapsed at a scrap metal recycling plant in Birmingham.
Wayne Hawkeswood and Graham Woodhouse were in charge of the site when the 45-tonne wall collapsed in July 2016 in the Nechells area of the city, and were each found guilty of four health and safety offences.
Their companies, Hawkeswood Metal Recycling and Ensco 10101 – named Shredmet at the time of the wall collapse, were fined £1m and £600,000 respectively for two health and safety breaches.
The five victims – Almamo Jammeh, Ousmane Diaby, Bangally Dukureh, Saibo Sillah and Mahamadou Jagana – were all killed instantly and had to be identified by their fingerprints.
A sixth man suffered serious leg injuries, having just stepped outside the bay before the wall came down.
A six-week trial at Birmingham crown court heard the wall had 263 tonnes of briquettes piled up against it causing it to become overloaded and fall on to the men who were clearing a bay on the other side.
An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found the wall had previously been taken down then reassembled, and the combined weight of the machine-pressed metal briquettes was the equivalent of six fully loaded HGVs.
A neighbouring company raised concerns about walls leaning from the site at least two years before the men were killed, the jury were told.
Passing sentence on Monday, Mr Justice Sweeting said evidence suggested the “wall must have been teetering on the brink of falling” before the collapse and the “final force which caused this massively heavy wall to fall over might have been nothing more than a gust of wind”.
In a statement following the sentencing, the families of the victims said: “We welcome and are relieved at the decision to convict and send to prison both directors of the company, as well as imposing on them a huge fine. We miss Ousmane, Saibo, Bangally, Almamo and Mahamadou every single day.
“On the day they died we made each of them a promise that we would secure justice. It has been a long and difficult road to get to this point. But we can now rest easier as our promise has been kept.”
The families said they were frustrated they had to wait so long to see justice, and previously told the Guardian they felt as if “our lives do not matter”.
The judge ordered Hawkeswood to pay a third of costs totalling £775,000, with the two companies to pay 20% each, and Woodhouse deemed unable to contribute.
Sweeting said that he accepted both men were of good character, the case had taken a personal toll on them and they “have expressed genuine remorse” for the deaths, but concluded a custodial sentence was unavoidable.
The HSE principal inspector, Amy Kalay, said: “I hope the families and friends of the men who died find some comfort in today’s sentencing.
“The investigation into this incident was long and complex. Five men lost their lives in the most appalling of circumstances. Their deaths should not have happened. They went to work to earn a wage; that cost them their lives.”
