A New Jersey contractor was sentenced to three months in prison on Friday and his company was fined $218,417 for a violation of safety regulations the led to the death of a worker at a Poughkeepsie job site.
Finbar O’Neill, 57, of Paramus, New Jersey and Onekey LLC of Hackansack, New Jersey, had pleaded guilty to willful violation of federal regulations resulting in death.
“Though technically a misdemeanor,” federal prosecutors said in a sentencing letter, “the defendants committed an extremely serious crime.”
The accident happened in August 2017 at the former A.C. Dutton Lumber Co., 1 Dutchess Ave., Poughkeepsie, where Onekey was building a 300-apartment complex.
An engineer had prepared a plan for piling up and moving dirt around three structures as they were being built, in accordance with U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations.
O’Neill deviated from the plan by ordering workers to build a temporary concrete block wall to hold back the soil. About 15 feet of soil was piled up, and heavy machinery was driven over the pile.
Several people at the site, according to court records, advised O’Neill that the wall was unsafe. He ignored the warnings.
The wall collapsed and crushed Maximiliano Saban, a native of Guatemala and the father of two children, and injured another worker. Both were employed by a subcontractor, New Generations Masonry, Hartford, Connecticut.
O’Neill’s attorneys recommended probation as an appropriate punishment, in a sentencing memorandum submitted to U.S. Magistrate Judge Paul E. Davison in White Plains federal court.
“His disregard of the OSHA regulation was an aberration and in no way reflective of the care he has for his employees’ safety,” attorneys Scott A. Resnik, Michael M. Rosensaft and Jake A. Nussbaum wrote.
His lawyers and numerous support letters depict a man who has devoted his life to family, community, employees and the needy.
He was born on a sheep, cattle and potato farm in Pomeroy, Ireland, and immigrated to the U.S. when he was 19.
He started out in a carpentry business and with his wife, Paula, went on to develop Onekey, a successful general contracting enterprise.
He helped other immigrants from Ireland find success in the U.S. He supported missions in Africa, India and Sri Lanka.
The Rev. Prince Robert Bellarmine, a Catholic priest, praised O’Neill’s support for a jungle mission in Sri Lanka and for daycare for children and clean drinking water in India.
He routinely helped with construction projects at his parish center and for individuals who needed help. He contributed to the Child Abuse Prevention Center and other charities.
He helped a quadriplegic man fulfill a lifetime dream of visiting Ireland and Medjugorje, a Catholic pilgrimage site
in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The irony, his lawyers wrote, is that the wall was built to protect workers.
When the accident happened he tried to rescue the victim.
He hosted a vigil at the job site for Saban’s family, covered the cost of the wake and funeral and repatriation of the body to Guatemala.
Onekey has paid a $281,583 civil penalty to OSHA, and O’Neill and Onekey have settled a lawsuit with the family for $2.8 million.
To this day, his children told the judge, he is devastated and distraught over the death.
His lawyers acknowledged that O’Neill was convicted in 2010 of making unlawful payments to a union representative in 2004. But they note that he provided substantial cooperation to the government “at great personal risk to himself and his business.”
“A man who does so much work for humanity needs to be spared jail time,” the Rev. Jonathan Yabiliyok, a Nigerian church leader wrote. “Finbar is a man whom I believe would affect humanity more positively on the outside than in the walls of a prison cell.”
But contrary to how O’Neill’s attorneys depict the circumstances, “bad luck was not the culprit here,” assistant prosecutors Steven J. Kochevar and Stephanie Simon wrote in a sentencing letter.
He willfully defied a simple construction regulation “to save time and money.” Even after he was warned that the concrete blocks could cause death or injury, and as dirt towered over workers, more soil was added.
The wall was not built to protect workers, the prosecutors contend, but to cut costs. Moreover, the workers needed protection because O’Neill and Onekey had already deviated from the engineering plan.
The prosecutors noted that O’Neill’s previous conviction was for fraud and extortion that allowed him to defraud a benefits fund. Before that, he was convicted of falsifying business records. In both cases, he received no jail time and was put on probation for five years.
“The common thread among these offenses is lack of honesty and cutting corners in business,” they wrote.
They recommended a prison sentence of no less than three months for O’Neill and a fine of no less than $250,000 for Onekey.
Insubstantial sentences, the prosecutors wrote, “will confirm a perception that construction companies can cut corners and receive a slap on the wrist.”
